


Little Spiderling

by Dorkangel



Category: Black Widow (Comics), Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Natasha is a Child, Angst with a Happy Ending, Author Is Sleep Deprived, BAMF Natasha, Badass SHIELD Agents, Ballerina-centric violence, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Canon-Typical Violence, Ceiling Vent Clint Barton, Clint Feels, Clint Has No Idea What He Is Doing, Clint Needs a Hug, Deaf Clint Barton, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Everyone Needs A Hug, Feels, Gen, HYDRA Trash Party, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hydra (Marvel), Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kid Fic, Kid Natasha, Kinda, Natasha Feels, Natasha Needs a Hug, Natasha Romanov Has Issues, Natasha Romanov Joins SHIELD, Natasha-centric, Nick Fury Knows All, Poor Bucky, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Protective Steve Rogers, SHIELD Family, Sneaky Nick Fury, Steve Feels, Steve is a little shit, The Author Has No Idea What Clint Is Doing, Up all night to get Bucky, will add more tags
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-18
Updated: 2015-01-20
Packaged: 2018-02-27 03:01:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 25,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2676521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dorkangel/pseuds/Dorkangel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha Romanov is twelve years old. She was born in the early two thousands, and raised to be a killer by HYDRA in an all-new Black Widow program.<br/>Until SHIELD found her. (They would call it rescue, she would call it kidnapping, Fury would call it recruitment, and Steve would like not to think about the moral implications, please.)<br/>Now it's all a matter of living and training with Clint and Steve, trying to be normal, and not killing anyone.</p><p>...well, maybe only people who deserve it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In the Beginning...

They found her in an unlocked cell, dressed in a little white dress as though she was about to go to a ballet class. She kicked her heels somewhat bitterly against the bed frame, angry tears pricking in her eyes, and ignored the shouts of the men with guns running past her door, yelling in Russian and English.

  
Her name was Natasha Romanoff, and she was twelve years old.

  
She glanced up, one hand hurrying to brush the insubordinate tears away - she didn't allow herself to cry - as a voice just outside called out: "Steve! I think there's someone in here!". Like the flip of a switch, her loose, shaky countenance became steely and rigid, her back as straight as a ruler, her eyes narrowed and focused on the door through downcast lashes and a bowed head. Better that they didn't see her face, and thought her harmless.

Her other hand slipped under the bedclothes to grip the handle of a kitchen knife that she had stolen.

  
"What do you mean there's someone- Oh, Jesus Christ, that's a kid. Has anyone found the keys?"

  
Natasha waited, like a cocked gun, for them to realise the obvious.

  
"It's unlocked!" continued the same voice. It was young, deep, confident. As American as apple pie. She made a mental note of it for later, in case the owner of the voice survived that long; he sounded like he could put up a fight

  
American Voice opened the door hesitantly, like he was worried he might frighten her. She just kept her head down, voluptuous red curls obscuring his vision of her face. For all he knew, she really might be frightened.

  
The concept almost made Natasha laugh.

  
"Hey," he said gently. "It's ok. How did you get here?"

  
She didn't answer, and turned away when he took a step closer, tightening her fingers around the knife. It was too big, badly balanced, but it would serve its purpose.

  
"Do you speak English?" he asked, in the same soft tone. She didn't look at his face, and did her best to ignore it as he went down into a crouch to try and get a better look at her. "It's ok, I'm not going to hurt you."

  
She glanced up slowly, allowing American Voice that one valuable look at her face. There: now he could potentially pick her out of a line up, out of a crowd. He himself couldn't be older than in his twenties, she thought, muscled and beefy and dressed in some kind of ridiculous costume. Costumes served only one purpose to Natasha; they were to hide yourself away. This costume only made him more recognisable. It was red, white and blue, striped and starred like the American flag.

  
"Don't be silly." she replied, keeping the childish highness and tremble out her voice as best she could. She made sure to speak with a slight accent, just so he would know she was Russian, not some kind of international assassin. Well, technically she _was_ an international assassin. He didn't have to know that, though.

  
He smiled, with a kind of sadness around the edge. Maybe he was older than he looked, mused Natasha. "What's so silly?"

  
Bam. She struck, one leg snapping out and delivering an incapacitating kick to the temple, pointe shoes finally coming in handy for a bit of extra weight to the blow. He made a kind of startled grunt, and his nose began to bleed, but he wasn't dead and he wasn't even unconscious, which was what she had been aiming for. Her expression tightened in annoyance, and in a few short seconds she had her thighs tightly wrapped around his thick neck in a choker hold. She had tried to make them stronger, but her arms simply weren't powerful enough to strangle him yet. She was wearing tights and shorts under the dress anyway.

"As if _you_ could hurt _me._ " she hissed vehemently, pressing the knife along his chest and searching for a weak spot in his armour. There didn't seem to be any, which perhaps explained the stupid costume.

"Sam!" yelled the soldier, struggling under her. He was strong, very strong, but Natasha had the advantage and besides, she was kneeling on his elbows, easily riding out any bucks that he was using to try and escape. "Clint!"

"Shut up!" she snapped. Her voice broke a little on the second word, and something deep down inside her winced at how much she sounded like a petulant child. He drew up his knees to try and kick her and for a moment she faltered in surprise, and then quickly gathered herself and stabbed the knife roughly into the palm of his hand, drawing a harsh cry as his struggles became weaker.

There were running footsteps outside, but it was too late, because the soldier's eyes had already rolled up inside his head and he went limp just as another one drew up outside the door; some nameless, faceless private hiding behind a helmet, like the millions of HYDRA drones that marched about her every day. She would have liked to make sure American Voice was dead, but there was no time and it was more important that these new people didn't see her, so she leapt gracefully off him (almost as if she really was a ballerina, she thought darkly) and darted past the other man, wasting no time in spinning on the point of her toes when he reached out and tried to grab her and sliding the knife under his bulletproof vest and through his ribs. She pulled it out as quickly as she could and was running again, wiping it frantically on the hem of her dress, trying to ignore the way the red stained the white silk. Maybe someone'll see it and think I was the one that was injured, she hoped desperately. There were too many soldiers here for her to fight, far too many, so she'd have to escape-

Someone caught her, strong arms wrapped around her waist, and lifted her into the air for all of the two seconds she wasted screaming in frustration and surprise, kicking in effectually at her captor's legs in a brief moment of panic, and then she stiffened and remembered her training, placing the flats of her feet on his stomach and reaching over her shoulder - hoping beyond hope that somehow he would be another dumb clone, too slow to see the knife coming - to blindly stab into his back. She heard a guttural, choking shout - oh good, she thought, I hit a lung - and kicked off him as though he was a spring board, landing in perfect position about a foot and a half away.

This time, Natasha didn't waste any more precious moments. She set off running, as fast as she could, sparing glances over her shoulder every couple of seconds. There were more soldiers behind her, American, and they looked more organised, better equipped, than the ones she had killed. One was barking into a walkie talkie as he bent over what was presumably the dying body of American Voice, while the others caught up to her. She felt a deep aching feeling of disappointment in her chest, and squashed it- there was no time to regret failing now. It wasn't like she could help the fact that their legs were longer than hers.

She skidded around a corner, blank and white and gleaming like all the corridors in this 'facility', and one of the windows smashed, breaking her rhythym and drawing a little gasp of surprise from her as the projectile that had broken it landed at her feet. It was some kind of canister, she thought, and then (as cloudy gas began spewing out of one end, sending it spinning even closer towards her) backpedalled in a panic. But the soldiers were behind her, so she could only go forwards, and she raised a hand to her dress and tried to hold the fabric up to cover her nose and mouth. It wasn't flexible enough, really, and it was hard to run like this, especially with one of her legs going numb and the other one tingly, all of her was tingly, really, and it was like trying to run through treacle- were the walls moving, or was it just her? Why was everything blurry? Was the floor getting c l o s e r-

The little girl collapsed, her legs crumpling beneath her, and the knife fell from her hands to spin away across the shining floor, leaving a streak of blood in its path.

"We've got her." barked the Falcon into his radio as he ran forwards, too concerned about what the kid might have done to Steve to worry about her safety. "Mind telling us who she is?"

"I don't know, or I'd tell you." came Hawkeye's voice, fuzzy with the bad connection all the way out here in the Russian wilderness. "Fury's got all the info locked. I've got a feeling it wasn't counter-terrorism files we came here for, though."

Sam cut off the radio and went down on one knee, then turned her onto her side. He tried to forget the way she looked like any other little girl while she was unconscious, her expression relaxed and unharrassed. "You've sure as hell got some explaining to do when you wake up." he muttered.


	2. Of Hawkeyes, Captains and Biting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I've realised I make quite a lot of references to 'voice' in this and I just wanna say it's because I have very bad eyesight. You can tell a lot about a person from their voice!

The sound of screaming coming from the secure section of SHIELD's hospital wing was enough to wake Steve up through the anaesthetic. He came to with a groan, just as the shrill howling cut off and someone yelped, and there was a whole load of scuffling.

 Feeling somehow as though he was going to regret to some extent everything that happened from the point where he opened his eyes onwards - like most days, really - the Cap cracked open his left eyelid and let the bright, artificial light filter through. His neck ached and most of his right arm was kind of numbly painful, but he'd survive.

Steeling himself for the full effect of any other injuries he might have acquired, Steve pushed himself upright and swung his legs over the side of the bed, suppressing another groan. After all, this was nothing like waking up after being frozen for so long. He had endured _that,_ and he was far less stiff.

For a moment he buried his head in his hands, and then felt the familiar footsteps of Sam Wilson and looked up with a bemused half smile at the younger man. "Anyone planning on telling me what's going on?"

Sam pulled a friendly grimace and shrugged, arms crossed over his chest. "The second I know anything important, I'll tell you."

"How many men did we lose?" asked Steve grimly, straight in for the kill as usual.

Sam hesitated - he would have been happier to tell his friend what the football results were, or how the weather was doing, or what their new schedule was, but Captain Rogers was a soldier through and through, like there was nothing else he knew how to be anymore - and then sat down on the empty bed opposite Steve and answered.

"Only three. One to the Russians, two to that kid. We thought she'd got you too for a good minute; you weren't breathing."

"And on the other side?"

"Pretty much the same, and we've got two for questioning."

The crease of a frown appeared between Steve's blonde brows. "What questioning? What information does Fury want?"

Sam held his hands out apologetically. "I don't know. SHIELD isn't really in a habit of telling either of us anything. Especially me."

The super-solider cursed under his breath and then let his resolve fall away, into the tired, slightly confused, eager to please puppy that he was inside. "Yeah, ok. Could have been worse, right?"

The other man smiled. "Yeah, could have been a lot worse."

There was another shriek, this one of anger, and more muffled scrabbling and talking.

"Ok," said Steve quickly, as Sam tried not to wince. "I was trying to ignore it, but I'm just going to go ahead and ask, what the hell is happening?"

"That little kid. They reckon something's up with her biology, or she wouldn't be able to-" He gestured to the purpling bruises around Steve's neck. "You know. But she wont work with us, at all. They tried checking her over for injuries and she started-" In the secure area, someone snarled and a nurse came stumbling out, clutching his hand and asking for bandages. "Uh, that."

Steve looked up and put a hand out to stop the nurse as he passed, smiling (in his somehow constantly patriotic way). "Excuse me, what's going on in there?"

The nurse gestured irritably with both hands, one of which had a nasty-looking and suspiciously teeth-shaped bruise forming. "The little Russian... _thing_ ...bit me once and Agent Barton twice. He's bleeding, but they kind of need him to hold her down."

Steve's eyebrows raised and he let the nurse pass. "Well," he said, turning back to Sam. "Now we have almost no more information and we know that Clint's in there."

"They need him to _hold her down_." Sam reminded him. "She's really, really dangerous. You might not remember, what with the lack of oxygen and all, but as I just said, she killed two men and she nearly killed you."

"She's a kid." responded the captain stoically, leaning even closer to Sam. "I think that-"

"She's not a child." came Director Fury's deep, mocking tones from the other end of the corridor, as he strolled authoritativelycloser to the pair. "She's a weapon disguised as a child."

"O-kay," muttered Sam under his breath. "My cue to go. Good luck, man." And with that, he patted Steve on the back and hurried off.

Eyes hardened and ready for an argument, Steve stood up and squared his shoulders, that self-same sense of surprise that he always got when he was taller than someone registering faintly in his mind. Usually, he didn't like it, since so often the person looking down on someone else was nothing more than a bully and a cowards, but with Director Fury... well, it helped, to feel like he was maybe at least partially in control. "And what makes you say that?"

Snorting in amusement, the one-eyed man threw a file roughly down on Steve's bedside table. He only hesitated a moment before looking at it; for some reason, things in files were always bad news, but they were always important bad news.

It was labelled 'Black Widow Project: KGB, 1957-?' and it was about as thick as Steve knew his file was- not that he had ever been allowed to read it. The first few pages were in Russian, and then there was a translation. It was hard to tell, sometimes, but it seemed to contain the details of twenty eight orphaned girls being forcibly 'recruited' for their stamina and intelligence. Aged six. They became assassins, Steve realised, they were forced to undertake procedures to make them better soldiers, they were manipulated and brainwashed until nothing of their personality was left and they were nothing more than mindless killers...

It was hauntingly familiar. He didn't really know anything about the Winter Soldier, no one did, but this was all somehow too reminiscent of it not to give Steve chills.

"The Black Widows were eliminated one by one until only one of them was left: Yelena Belova, who was shot through the head by an unknown sniper in 1999." read Steve out loud.

"And HYDRA picked up the project." finished Nick. "We found evidence to suggest that they had been investigating it, on a hard drive in the early two thousands, but no one had any idea that they had gone this far."

Steve cocked his head disbelievingly at the senior officer, unable to relate the petite, slim - albeit deadly - figure of the little girl that had attacked him with the threatening-looking women that had been photographed in the file. "You're saying that _she_ is a 'Black Widow'?"

"She is _the_ Black Widow. Last time, there were twenty eight. This time, there's one. And god knows what they've managed to do to her, with the technology that's evolved since the Cold War."

Steve glanced at where the male nurse was running back past them with bandages, as the angry screaming started up again, and back to Nick Fury, eyes carefully blank of emotion. "Alright, I'm listening. What do you want me to do?"

"We need her on our side," replied Fury, surprisingly gently. "And we've seen how HYDRA treats its weapons. She's nothing more than a weapon."

"You keep saying that." replied Steve, trying to supress his righteous anger. "She's not. She's a kid- oh, for god's sake, what's her name?"

Unruffled as usual, Nick smirked. "We don't know. She won't tell us."

"Because she's a frightened little girl." argued Steve, receiving an annoying patronising head shake in answer.

"Because she's been trained in advanced interrogation technique. See, this is the reason that you're the perfect man for the job."

Hearing an element of smugness and victory come into his boss's voice, Steve rubbed his temple for a moment and shifted uncomfortably , resisting the urge to roll his eyes, and settled in for something of a lecture.

"You actually believe in the elemental goodness of people, and you've got enough strength and military training to handle her. You can look after her- and, hey, who's not going to trust Captain America?"

"A Russian kid?" asked Steve exhaustedly. "Look, have I done anything specific to earn babysitting duty, or am I just getting on your nerves, 'cos If it's the latter-"

"You'd do well to remember that she's a murderer." repeated Fury, his tone suddenly deadly serious again. "She got you once, Rogers, and we might be on home turf now and we might know to be wary of her, but she could get you again."

"Why are you asking me to do this?" asked Steve plainly, voice similarly grim, staring into Fury's one good eye. They had passed that point again: he was tired of the mind games.

"Because," replied the older man simply. "In this business, if she isn't with us, she's against us. And after the devastation that the Black Widows caused last time, we sure as hell can't afford to have her against us."

 

*

 

Natasha glared up at the man she had bitten - it was his fault, anyway, for reaching over to hold her shoulders from in front of her instead of behind, stupid man - from where they had strapped her wrists and ankles down tightly enough to stop her from moving on the hospital bed someone had miraculously managed to make her lie in.

"Y'know," he muttered, avoiding her smouldering gaze with something close enough to alarm to satisfy Natasha _deeply._ "It's kinda rude to bite people who are trying to see if you're hurt."

Her scowl only deepened, and she tried unsuccessfully to aim a kick at him. _They_ were the ones that kidnapped _her_ , and she was supposed to be grateful? Granted, her entire life from the point of her parent's death onwards (not that she was old enough to remember, at the time) had been one great big series of people kidnapping her, but they required obedience, not gratitude, which was far easier to give. She watched the last of the doctors, nurses and orderlies file out of the room, and released an exasperated breath, letting her head flop down against the pillow.

I'll just ignore the indignant one, she decided, and closed her eyes.

Clint watched her (mostly out of the corner of his eye, because _damn_ that kid was unnerving) and felt something like guilt twinge in his chest when she stopped glaring and seemed to give up a little. This was the SHIELD hospital wing, so naturally they hadn't got any child-size medical gowns, and the adult one that they had found for her was about a million sizes too big. She looked out of place and almost innocent, in stark juxtaposition to the expression on her face most of the time and what he had been told she did and could do.

He pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment, all too familiar with the discomforting stress that this kind of work brought about. It's not about what you think is right, he reminded himself.

And, on the subject of walking moral dilemmas, Captain America knocked on the door and walked in.

"Hey, Cap," he greeted cheerfully, batting his eyelids. "Come to see me? You're so damn romantic."

Steve chuckled good-naturedly, eyeing the prone, small figure on the bed. "Hello to you too. Is she awake?"

Clint shrugged. "Yeah, think so. She's not being friendly, though."

Natasha opened her eyes slightly and cocked her head to one side, looking through her lashes at American Voice. He was still alive, apparently, and no longer dressed in the costume, wearing a plain white t-shirt and grey sweatpants instead. He was even taller than she had realised, she noted, with muscles like a disproportionate marble statue and the kind of wholesome good looks that she automatically didn't trust.

"Hi." he greeted her, with such forced brightness that she snorted in amusement and closed her eyes again. Clearly this wasn't important, or she'd be tied to a chair, not a bed, in an interrogation room, not a medical area.

She heard his footsteps coming closer, and braced herself mentally for some kind of threat. Indignant One was still watching, and he was clearly under orders not to damage her, or he would have responded after she bit him, so American Voice probably wouldn't hit her in front of him. Probably. There were no rules against promising to, though, when no one could see, in any organisation. She learned that the hard way.

Outwardly, she didn't move, and Steve crouched down next to her so that they were the same height, thanking god that this time she was held down and didn't have a knife.

"My name's Steve." he told her quietly. She opened her eyes and blinked coldly at him, once, unimpressed, but a little inwardly surprised at the lack of promises of violence.

What is he doing? she wondered. She didn't care about him, beyond slight disappointment that she hadn't been able to choke him for long enough.

"Can you tell me your name?" he continued, and she finally caught on. I'm not a baby! something inside her protested. I'm not stupid!

"If I had a choice," she replied, all traces of an accent and any feeling gone from her voice. "You would be dead."

"Do you want anything to do?" he asked, trying to ignore her cold, cold green eyes. "A book, a sketchpad, anything...?"

Natasha brows creased slightly, and she glanced curiously at both men before resolutely in the other direction. "No."

My hands are tied anyway, she thought, biting her lip from force of infantile habit. It helped her to think.

"Well, ok." agreed Steve, standing up. "If you do want anything, though, just shout."

He turned to Clint, and had to force himself not to smile at the incredulous look on the other man's face. 'I'll explain later', he mouthed, and then looked over his shoulder at Natasha, who was still facing away from them.

"Oh, this is Agent Clint Barton, by the way. Clint, would you mind talking to me outside for a moment?"

"Um, sure."

They walked into the corridor fairly calmly, and Clint closed the door behind them like nothing important was happening.

And then turned to Steve with his arms in the worldwide gesture for 'WHAT THE FUCK, MAN?!' and his eyebrows somewhere beyond his hairline, mouth slightly open.

"What the hell are you doing?! Not saying I've got a problem or anything, 'cos, you know, little girl, you're going to want to be nice to her, but-"

"Is that door soundproof?" asked Steve, perfectly seriously, and Clint scoffed and ran a hand through his short hair.

"Of course it's soundproof, this is SHIELD. Every door in here is soundproof except the one to Coulson's bedroom."

Steve nodded and then frowned confusedly at his teammate. "How do you know that?"

Clint hesitated, then smiled broadly. "No reason."

"...ok. Fury said I have to get her on our side."

The archer stared at Steve's face for a couple of seconds before beginning to shake his head, slowly. "No."

"What do you mean, 'no'?"

"Don't pull the innocent act." accused Clint, wagging a finger. _Oh, I'm Captain America_ , he thought bitterly, _I never curse or lie and I always help old ladies cross the road and I have a soft spot for miniature Russian assassins_. "You are not getting me involved in this."

He set off walking rapidly towards his room, practically able to _hear_ Steve rolling his eyes as he hurried after. "Come on! This is important!"

"No way."

"She's a valuable asset, Clint, and all the other agents are going to treat her like an object. She's a little girl!"

"She scares me!"

"She needs looking after by actual human beings, like you and me, not militaristic nutjobs like Fury."

Clint turned sharply on his heels, looking like he would really rather have a lie down than do any of this, and almost collided directly with Steve's infamous pecs. "Fine!" he exclaimed, a resigned tone to his voice. "But, one, I have a feeling that if I don't agree with this, either you or Fury is going to make me do it; two, you're absolutely right, but don't tell anyone I said it; and three, _we left her alone_."

Steve paled slightly. "Oh heck."

"'Heck' doesn't cover it, buddy." joked Clint, tugging the super-soldier with him to jog in the direction they had come. "She's probably taken out half of the tower by now."

"Very funny." replied Steve gravely. "Tell it to the men that are dead."

"Oh, lighten up, we're going to have to work with her."The left half of the archer's face pulled up into an amused half-smile and he laughed a little. "Hey, could you imagine if he'd asked Tony or Phil to take care of her?"

Steve pulled a face, obediently 'lightening up'. "Jeez, let's not even talk about giving Tony responsibility over a child. Who's Phil?"

"Phil Coulson." replied Clint, like it was obvious, as they stopped outside the Black Widow's room again. Steve blanched.

"'Phil'? His first name is 'Agent'."

Clint shook his head, still smiling, and then gathered himself to open the door and walk calmly in again. Steve followed.

 

 *

 

Natasha heard them come in again and decided to act like she had fallen asleep. It was certainly plausible, and maybe they'd talk as though she wasn't there and she could work out what was going on. And how to get away- eventually.

"Is she asleep?" whispered Indignant One - Clint, she reminded herself - and she heard a slight rustle as American Voice - Steve - shook his head.

"Probably not. You can hear us, right?"

She didn't respond, keeping her breathing steady and just audible enough to be counted as soft snores.

"Yeah, ok." replied Steve tiredly. "We're going to be in here until you decide to drop that, anyway."

"What?" asked Clint, sounding more genuinely curious than anything, and received a shrug in return from Steve.

"Director Nick Fury's orders."

Natasha opened her eyes at that, just in order to give him her best withering look. Had it been solely levelled at Clint, its effect would doubtless have made him take at least a step back, but Steve had spent enough time with Peggy Carter that he weathered it admirably.

"I know when I'm being spoken to." she told him, high voice very clearly annoyed. "You don't need to patronise me."

He nodded, lips quirking in acknowledgment of her statement, and sat down on one of the always-too-small plastic hospital chairs that had been provided. "Alright. If you'll act like an adult and tell us your name, at least, we'll treat you like one."

She kept up the piercing stare at him, but more like she was considering it, and he continued with the faintest glimmer of hope that he was actually getting somewhere. "It's not like we're asking for your darkest secret, is it?"

Her shoulders sagged and she looked straight up at the ceiling, determined to stay in control of the situation. She didn't only know when she was being patronised: she knew when she was being manipulated as well, and 'Steve' clearly wasn't very practised in it. Still, she was in a foreign country, surrounded by enemies, she couldn't run and she couldn't fight, and he didn't seem as though he would try to use the information against her. It was just a name, after all.

The little girl realised that she was biting her lip again and stopped it, turning back to Steve with a warning in her face. 'I will trust you,' said her expression. 'But only just this once, and with this little, unimportant piece of information, and if you betray me there will be hell to pay'.

"Natalie." she lied, eyes flickering over him to see if he knew that it wasn't exactly the truth. It wasn't exactly a lie, either: Natasha was a diminutive of Natalia, the same as Natalie, but it wasn't her name. "My name is Natalie."

Steve smiled warmly at her. "Nice to meet you, Natalie. I'm Captain Rogers, also known as Captain America."

She pointed her chin proudly in the other direction. "Well," she sniffed. "That's dumb."


	3. Appearances Can Be Deceiving

Natalie's scans were being brought back and she was trying to move beyond her bonds to look at them, curious, and so Clint thought it might finally be safe to voice an opinion with her in the room.

"You know," he whispered to Steve, when he thought she wouldn't hear. "Eventually she's going to have to eat and go to the bathroom. She can't just stay there forever."

Steve frowned at him, as if the possibility of her 'just staying there' hadn't even occurred to him, when it was very clearly still the only 100% safe option. "Of course not."

"Well, what are you going to do about it?"

Steve offered him The Patriotic Smile - which the poor guy probably didn't realise that artists had worked tirelessly to reproduce on posters for about seventy years straight - and stepped forward into Natalie's direct vision, doing his best to pretend he didn't see her unamused scowl.

"I know we got off to a bad start," he began cheerfully, and then his eyes widened and his hand went instinctively to his gun as she laughed once, very harshly and suddenly. Steve swallowed and steeled himself. "But you're a-"

"I still wish you were dead." she murmured under her breath as he continued.

"But you're a person, and that basically means that eventually you'll have to move."

Her eyes narrowed in suspicion and she nodded slowly.

"So, I was thinking we could make a deal." He made a reasoning gesture with his hands, sitting down on a chair again so she wouldn't have to crane her neck to glare at him. "SHIELD is essentially the same as HYDRA. Kind of- not really." He ran his hands uncomfortably through his hair. "I mean, we're not Nazis." Where was I going with this? he screamed internally. Oh yeah, I remember. "But we are an intelligence agency, and I reckon we function in pretty much the same way."

"Get to the point." she stated, calmly.

"If you swear not to _actually_  kill us, however much you'd like to," he concluded, with that same unselfconscious, awkward smile. "You'll be assigned to me and Agent Barton and we won't kill you either."

Stunned, Natasha blinked flutteringly and bit her lip again as she considered it. On one hand, SHIELD would be safer with her neutralised. Dead. They would be better off if she was dead- that was just a fact. So _she_ would be safer if she did what they wanted.

But if HYRDA caught hold of her again, and she had voluntarily worked against them, for SHIELD, they would... Well, there were worse things than death.

 _But I have to stay alive,_ whispered something very small and very quiet, underneath all her training.

If they ask, she decided, I don't know anything. HYDRA told me nothing. I worked for them blindly- in fear for my life? She pondered the idea for a moment, then rejected it. It sounded too pathetic, and she couldn't afford to show these people any weakness.

"There isn't really any choice." replied Natasha eventually, hoping that they'd somehow take her deliberately cryptic answer for a positive one, and wondered immediately why she hadn't _just lied_.

Steve beamed. "Great."

In the background, Clint shook his head disbelievingly. "This is not going to end well." he hummed to himself.

 

*

 

Natasha stared up at the gym with a mix of emotions churning in her gut.

Or maybe that was just the food she had eaten, after being hungry for a long time. It was hard to tell.

Anticipation was there, certainly, and even excitement, because _this_ she knew how to do. In the back of her mind, she was already running through training exercises and routines, moves that she could if they wanted her to fight someone bigger than her, like Steve- or even Clint (although she was less worried about Clint).

Maybe there was fear, she didn't know. Fear of failure, fear of pain? She refused to acknowledge it.

She glanced leisurely over her shoulder, keeping up an unruffled façade for the sake of dignity, and wished that her line of vision came up to higher than Steve's abdomen. "Is this where you want me to practise?" she asked softly, chin tilted very high to look at his face. He nodded.

"Yeah, I guess. There must be thousands of these things around here, and they're probably all the same, but..." he trailed off. "I don't know, if anything's too hard or too easy, you tell us, ok?"

She scoffed, and didn't bother to reply.

The twisting ache of worry in Steve's heart increased. They had given her a black jumpsuit to put on instead of the overly large hospital gown, and it only accentuated her flaming hair and pale features. Nothing about her seemed natural, least of all her actions. What the hell had HYDRA done?

"Are you going to practise too?" she asked, something surprisingly vulnerable in her eyes as she kept looking at him.

He shot a glance a Clint, who shrugged, and made a noncommittal gesture. "That depends whether you want us to."

She hesitated, and then looked at the floor. "I don't mind."

Steve nodded. It was clear that she didn't want them to. "Alright then, I guess I won't. Clint?"

Clint tilted his head for a moment, as though he was considering it, and then shook as well. "Nah. You cool with us watching, Natalie?"

Her mouth felt dry and she began to want to _do something_ urgently. She didn't make decisions, beyond whether to use her legs or her fists to take out an opponent; the people she worked for made decisions. Why were they asking her?

She chanced a shy look at each of them through her lashes. "I would prefer it if I wasn't watched...?" she asked, voice quiet and sore like sandpaper on her throat as the words struggled out. Her heart was pounding so loudly inside that she began to be anxious that they would hear it. There was no way that she had been daring enough to ask something like that, insubordination on the first day wasn't exactly something that could ever be allowed, and was this even her first day? How long had she been unconscious?

As her mind raced, Steve just nodded. "Fair enough." She was biting her lip again, he realised, and that didn't seem to be a good thing. If she wanted to be alone, h would respect that.

He turned around and took a few steps back, making to close the doors, only for Clint to stop him with a hand on his arm.

"Wait," intoned the archer, loud enough for the little girl to hear and freeze, eyes flying to him for orders. Steve raised a warning eyebrow, and was on the verge of just barking a command at Clint to _for god's sake, leave her alone, we're trying to build something here,_ when he pulled his bow and two arrows out of the quiver that he wore on his back.

"There are cameras in there." he explained, jogging forwards so he was standing alongside her, and raising the bow so smoothly and rapidly up to his face that the other two only really had time to blink before there was one long, black arrow planted squarely through the lens of an ugly grey security camera that was perched in one corner of the room, quivering slightly with the force of impact, and watch, stunned, as he spun around and did the same to the other camera directly opposite it.

Steve began laughing breathlessly, quiet in the background, but Natasha just stared at Clint with huge green eyes and a mouth that had - although she would deny it until the end of time - opened just the tiniest bit in shock.

Forcing himself not to think about how much she had been freaking him out, Clint clapped a friendly hand on her should, tried to ignore the way she jumped back slightly, unused to non-hostile physical contact. "Good luck, kid." he added, and backpedalled to follow Steve out. 

She unfroze slightly, and the barest raw hint of a shaky smile flickered across her lips. Clint pretended it didn't surprise him, and grinned back. There was a whole lot of pretending to be ok to do with dealing with Natalie, he realised.

The doors closed and Steve looked at the smaller man for an explanation, rolling his eyes when Clint just put his bow and quiver down and kept walking.

"What?" he asked, mock-innocently. "It's only fair. Anyway, I'm going to hurry to get coffee, you feel free to stand guard."

"I'm not sure this was what Fury planned on happening when he asked me to do this." called Steve after him.

"Then he should have asked someone else!".


	4. Paint My Spirit Gold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally!

The first thing she saw that really called to her was the uneven parallel bars. Natasha wasn't the strongest person in the entire world, maybe, - and however much that frustrated her, she couldn't help it, she was smaller than ninety nine percent of the population - but she could hold at least double her own weight, and that was certainly useful on exercises like this. She was flexible too, and her coordination was near perfect.

"If you're listening, " she said coldly, voice neither loud nor soft. "I'm going to use the parallel bars."

No one replied. Obviously.

She nodded to herself once, preparing for the first twinge and ache of her muscles that made her want to scream every time she exercised like this, without warm up or any activity beforehand. HYDRA had made sure that she always practised like that, because in the real world she wouldn't have any time to do stretches before she was attacked. At least, that was what she was told.

Natasha took one long step back and began to run towards the bars with easy, powerful strides that brought her quickly to them, bare feet thudding gently against the smooth wood of the gym floor, and leapt at them with all the perfect grace of the ballerina she was not, wirily strong arms struggling to bring her up into a vertical position but somehow managing to do so smoothly, and for a single moment they held her suspended in the air, and then the hurt of bits of her arms pulling and ripping started. Her face became fixed in concentration, and she twisted her wrist around and kicked her legs up in the air and to the right until her entire body had turned so far that her wrist would break if she didn't let go, and so she simply let go, swivelling around so that she could grab onto the other bar with her right hand and then with her left hand too and pull herself around and into a somersault.

She came close to perfecting the move. Really close.

But maybe the bars were further apart than what she was used to, designed for an adult and not a child, or maybe she simply miscalculated, because her legs failed to hook over the metal rod and she tried desperately to reach for them but she couldn't grab on and then she was tumbling down and landing heavily on her side with a muffled cry, as the air left her lungs in a rush.

For a few seconds, everything went black, and then all of her hurt. Her ribs were especially painful and tightly constricting, her head was throbbing and there were bruises blossoming down the entirety of her left side. None of that mattered, though.

What mattered was that she had _failed,_ and failure was unacceptable, she was going to be hurt, corrected, improved...

Natasha gasped, her lungs seeming to have shrunk to a fraction of their normal size, her teeth bit down hard on her lower lip as panic overtook her, and she scooted frantically back along the shiny floor until she was pressed hard against the wall, arms flying up to wrap around her head in order to protect her from some imagined threat. Numbly, she felt tears begin to spill past her flickering eyelids, and she scrunched them shut, trembling. Her limbs didn't feel like part of her body: her body didn't feel like it was a part of her in the first place, and it was frightening.

The attack passed, but Natasha stayed rigidly folded against the wall, waiting for the consequences of her failure.

None came.

Clint had taken out the cameras, she realised, the shock jarring her. No one had seen, no one had heard, and so long as she could hide any marks, no one would know.

No one would hurt her.

She took one long, steadying breath, and forced herself to stand up, wiping one sleeve of the black jumpsuit across her eyes to get rid of the tears. Her face carefully shifted into a hardened, blank expression. If no one saw that happen, she reminded herself, there's no reason to be anything more than a machine to anyone, and walked with smooth, measured steps into the middle of the room, brushing her scarlet hair over her cheek to hide a bruise.

Head tilted curiously to one side, she surveyed the rest of the equipment in the room with casual interest. The rowing machine didn't offer enough of a challenge, and she wasn't bored enough just to use the weights yet...

There. What was that?

There was a kind of ladder going up the side of the wall, its rungs eventually becoming monkey bars along the roof for the use of more adventurous agents. A slow, mirthless smile tugged at one edge of her mouth, and she glanced back towards the door, a sort of plan forming in her mind.

 

*

 

Half an hour had passed, and - their coffee either cold or finished, and anxious concern settling like a lead weight in their stomachs - Steve finally voiced both his and his fellow agent's thoughts.

"Um, Clint?"

The archer's eyes darted towards him nervously.

"Have you heard anything from in there? At all?"

Clint hesitated, and then shook his head. "No. But in fairness, I am deaf." He touched a compulsive finger to his hearing aid, and then raised an eyebrow at Steve. "Guessing you haven't either?"

"No." The super-soldier's voice was uneasy, and he leaned tiredly against the wall.

Clint's brows furrowed, and he stared at Steve. "She- I mean, s-she can't have got out, could she?"

"No," said Steve quickly. "No, of course not. That'd be impossible. I've been here this whole time."

"Yeah," laughed Clint shakily. "I'm being silly. Doesn't matter."

For a moment there was a tension-filled silence, and similarly ridiculous thoughts began to fill both their heads. Eventually, Clint broke it, blurting out: "There's no way she could have drilled through the floor, right? We would have noticed, right?"

"Don't be dumb- but the roof has got to be impossible to cut through, because if it's not then..."

"That's impossible."

"Yeah."

"Got to be."

"...yeah. Still," continued Steve, face flushing in embarrassment.  "Perhaps we should check on her."

"Not because we think she's escaped or anything!" Clint clarified quickly.

"No, of course not-"

" 'Cos if she had, Fury would kill us."

Steve swallowed. _Not if she got to us first._ "Yeah, I know. Just that she's a kid, that's all."

"Yeah."

Neither of them moved, Clint looking expectantly towards the older man, until eventually Steve sighed, put on his best _Sure kid, I'm Captain America, I know what I'm doing_ face, and forced himself to take a step forwards and knock hesitantly on the door, putting one ear up to it to see if he heard anything.

Nothing.

"Natalie? We're going to come inside now, if that's ok."

If she was still in there, she didn't answer, and Steve pushed them slowly open, bracing himself. Slightly behind him (if Steve was anything, he made a wonderful human shield) Clint was as tense as a drawn bow-string, watching.

...the room was completely empty. At a glance, anyway. It wouldn't be frightening to anyone else - it was a just an empty gym with all the lights turned on, the slight smell of feet everywhere, like all gyms - but Steve felt his heart plummet from somewhere in his throat to the very pit of his stomach.

"Shit." breathed Clint, and Steve took a deep breath and turned around to glare at him.

"For god's sake, Barton, could you possibly be less helpful-"

"Are you looking for me?" chimed a high, innocent voice, echoing around the huge room.

Steve's head whipped upwards and his eyes widened as he saw her: perched on a rafter in the far left corner of the gym, ages away from the ladder and the rungs along the ceiling. She was smiling slightly.

"Double shit." he heard from Clint, and didn't even bother to correct him.

Steve blinked slowly, pushing all the parts of him that wanted to run away into the very back of his mind (he had become adept at that) and then smiled shakily at her. "I didn't see you there! Are you alright?"

"Perfectly." she replied sweetly, still poised like a loaded weapon on the thin beam.

"You get stuck?" he continued cheerfully. "Need some help down?"

She stood up, balancing easily, and adjusted her hair slightly, not even deigning to look at them. "No."

And with that, she jumped down, rolling as she landed and coming to a stop in a perfect standing position.

Steve coughed. "So, um, what do you think of the gym?"

Her hand came up to check that none of her bruises were still visible, and she hid it by brushing at one eye, as if there was something in it.

"It was fine." she said, smile fading now and tone cold again. "Just a gym."

Steve nodded, and Clint finally stepped into the light, knowing exactly the feeling of the acute look of confusion on Steve's patriotic Labrador-ish face. "I think we should show Natalie her room now, Cap?"

He looked over his shoulder to shoot a look of gratitude at Clint, but Clint wasn't looking at him. For a moment, a look of absolute terror had flashed across Natalie's face, before she had time to school her expression back to blank again. So, for whatever reason, the idea of her room scared her- had HYDRA kept her in a cell or something? he wondered anxiously. Had they locked her up?

It wasn't like she would willingly tell them.

Inwardly, he sighed. Back to square one, then, square one being: What the hell is wrong with this kid?


	5. Lying Hurts Less

'Her room'. Those were nice words for it. Innocent, inconspicuous. Natasha was beginning to understand how SHIELD worked now: they liked to delude themselves, believing that they were the heroes, and everybody else was a bad guy. This was the kind of place where they would say 'training' when what they meant was 'conditioning', 'questioning' when they meant 'torture'... and 'room' when they meant 'cell'. It was all the same in the end, whether or not you tried to cover the atrocities up, and the all the false sweetness of a sugar-coat would do was leave a bitter taste in your mouth.

But she followed them anyway. It wasn't like there was a much of a choice.

On the way, they came face to face with a tall man in a leather coat, wearing an eyepatch with scars radiating out from under it, and the two agents paused respectfully to let him by. She stayed behind them, silent, and observed, staring at the floor just ahead of her in something of a confused attempt not to look anyone dangerous in the eye. _Like wild animals,_ she thought. _Unless you're causing trouble, t_ _hey only attack if you look them in the eye._

The commander (that was what he had to be, it only made sense) stopped and looked her over anyway, and then shot a loaded glance Steve and Clint. "You've trained?" he asked, voice strong and very clearly used to being in control. It was the kind of voice that people used when they were asking her how long exactly she could hold her breath for now, how much weight precisely she could lift, how many grown men she could possibly fight at once. Given the question, it was exactly the voice she expected.

"She's trained, a little." replied Steve warmly. "Just seeing if one of our gyms measured up to standard, right, Natalie?"

She flicked her eyes upwards at him - he was twisted a little to face both of them, arms crossed over his chest, unconsciously anxious half-smile playing over his lips, while Clint just seemed to be assessing the danger level of the situation, like her, and the other man just stood with his arms informally in his pockets and an air of command permeating his personal space, not exactly hindered by the sunglasses-ed, suited bodyguards at his shoulders - and then looked down again almost immediately.

"The cameras seemed to have shorted out." continued the commander, one expressive eyebrow arching. "Anyone know anything about that?"

He phrased it like a dare. _Someone's got to admit to this_ , warned his voice, _and it's going to be one of you three that does, and takes the fall. Unless someone has a goddamn_ wonderful _excuse._

Natasha's breathing hitched minutely, and for a fraction of a second she wondered if she should raise her hand like a disobedient child and take whatever punishment this man could give, instead of leaving it to Agent Barton, because, after all, he had taken the cameras out because she had been dizzily brave enough to ask to be unwatched. She dismissed the thought, though. Clint was kind, but he wasn't her primary objective. Without express orders otherwise from HYDRA, _she_ was her primary objective.

"That would be me." deadpanned Clint. The threat in his voice was just as clear, and Natasha cringed slightly. She didn't want them to fight; mainly, she didn't want Clint to get in trouble over what he had done _for her_ , without her asking, without any ulterior motive, just to be nice. "It didn't seem right for some intelligence agency to, oh, I don't know, be watching someone at all times and attempting to control their movements."

She almost laughed, and bit her lip partially to stop herself and partially from the hysterical nervousness bubbling up inside her. The commander hesitated a moment, and then snorted, amused. "I'll talk to you about that later." he promised, shaking his head, and Clint smiled briefly.

"Yessir, Director Fury, sir."

"Yeah," muttered the man. "Now you're respectful. Where are you taking her, Rogers?"

Steve snapped out of whatever he had been doing (mentally facepalming, by the look of it) and blinked once before answering. "Hm? Oh. We were taking Natalie to see her room, sir."

"Good idea." nodded Director Fury, and then turned to Natasha. "Just to tell you, little miss Black Widow, the windows in that room could withstand a tank, and the cameras in there will _not_ be being removed. Do you understand?"

Her heart sank a little, but she nodded blankly. "Yes, Director Fury." she said softly, just in case a verbal answer was required of her. She didn't know this place well enough to be sure yet. "I understand."

It was meant to be unfeeling, but her high, childish voice shone through that, and the old man actually paused for a second before bending over so that he was her height and hissing, "And I know your name isn't Natalie, by the way, Widow." too quietly for the others to hear.

"Yes, Director Fury." she replied, her eyes locking suddenly onto his own intense, monocular gaze. Neither of them moved, and then he stood up slowly and she looked away once again and allowed some of the stiffness to leak out of her shoulders, some of the bruises on her left side aching from the movement.

"I'll send these two with you." he continued to Steve, almost cheerfully, with a gesture to the armed men behind him. "To watch her door."

 _No!_ screamed the little voice in the back of her head, through her conditioning. _I won't cause trouble, I won't try and escape, I'll do what you want, I don't need guarding and pushing around and more barked orders and harsh words and-_

"Do you really think that's necessary?" asked Clint uncomfortably.

"Yes, actually." replied Fury casually, striding away. True to his words, the two guards stayed where they were, unmoving. "And I'll have Coulson keep an eye on you." he shouted, the words echoing back to them down the long corridor, almost perfectly identical to every long, sterile corridor that Natasha had ever seen, at HYDRA or SHIELD.

Steve watched him go with hard eyes just supressing indignant anger. _We've got this covered_ , he wanted to bark. _She doesn't need scaring. She's not just a weapon._

But, helplessly, he didn't.

 

*

 

It wasn't like her 'room's at the other facility. They were mostly identical to the one that Steve had found her in, some decorated with HYDRA propaganda posters, others dispassionately bare.

The one that she would hesitantly call her favourite, where she had been kept for about a year when she was eleven, had only a military issue steel bedframe and an empty table, and had only one single peeling poster on the whitewashed walls. The poster was one of the Winter Soldier, and it was the reason that she liked the room in the first place: a red background and a black silhouette with one silver arm, standing confidently, hands in tight fists. _He cannot be stopped_ , was written in white Russian letters, on his body. It was a little sinister, really, but no less than everything else around her, and she thought it was comforting. Maybe that was what Steve - 'Captain America' - was to normal children, she mused.

She did not find the Winter Soldier comforting because he was a superhero. She found him comforting because she knew that he would protect her, if he could. Not that either of them knew why.

 

_He was screaming through the piece of rubber in his mouth, yelling, there was pain in his head, his brain was burning-_

_In a sudden moment of clarity, he remembered everything, and he was falling off a bridge, and he wasn't just screaming because of the pain, he was calling Steve's name, pleading for help._

_And then everything disappeared again, and he wasn't Bucky, wasn't Sergeant Barnes, he was just a nameless soldier whose only purpose was to do as he was told. Establish HYDRA as the ruling force on this planet._

_Chest rising and falling rapidly as his panicked breaths evened out, the Winter Soldier looked upwards at the scientists and soldiers who had brainwashed him - he didn't even know if he knew them, everyone was suddenly a perfect stranger - with dead eyes._

_"He's ready." stated a tall, pockmarked man that the Winter Soldier knew only as the person whose orders had to be obeyed. Had the Winter Soldier spoken out loud, even his voice would have had more emotion in it than this man's, which was quite an achievement considering that he didn't really remember what emotions were yet. Pierce, he remembered with a start. Alexander Pierce. "But if we freeze him now he won't be any use to us when he wakes up. Let him wander around for a while."_

_The clamps around his arms snapped open (he hadn't realised that they were there, and the sudden lack of pressure was disorientating) and he glanced up at Pierce, blue eyes puppy-dog wide and confused, his pupils alarmingly dilated as he rubbed his sore, flesh right arm with his metal left. "I don't-" he began, but was cut off._

_"Find him a shirt." barked Pierce. "Tell him where to go to train. I haven't got time for this."_

_They directed him to a huge room with a high ceiling, filled with exercise equipment, and he stared blankly at it for a moment. Why did he need to exercise?_

_Don't ask questions, he reminded himself. He didn't know why he shouldn't ask questions, but he knew not to, and he knew not to ask why._

_The sound of shouts, blows and heavy footsteps caught his attention, and his vision snapped over to the side, where he could see a man fighting... someone ...in a boxing ring. They weren't boxing, though. What they were doing was far more savage, lawless._

_The smaller of the two of them kicked their leg high into the air, feigning towards their opponent's face, and then twisted around and dispatched him with a blow to the stomach that left him doubled over, struggling to breathe._

_It couldn't be._

_That was a little girl. She couldn't be older than ten, maybe eleven and small for her age. Her hair was red and curly, and pale face was rigidly determined._

_She cocked her head curiously at her fallen opponent, and asked a short question in Russian. The man, who was drenched in sweat and still clutching his stomach, shook his head and clambered out of the ring, limping away and out of the room._

_She watched him go, shoulder blades still rigid and visible through the back of her black t-shirt._

_Curious, and somewhat horrified, the Winter Soldier began to walk towards her. His steps were no heavier than usual, but one side of him was, in fairness, part metal, and - although for all he knew, he had been wearing them for years - the heavy boots on his feet were unfamiliar to him, and so he seemed to be stomping loudly against the floor._

_She startled slightly, and hurried to turn around and face him, body becoming tense so quickly that the Winter Solider actually feared for her health and stopped where was, raising his metal hand slightly in a 'stop' gesture to show that he didn't mean to threaten her._

_Her eyes narrowed suspiciously anyway, and she flexed her hands, where her short nails had left imprints on her palms as she balled her fists._

_"Are you here to fight me?" she asked, in Russian, and he shook his head._

_"I can do it." she protested quickly. "I can fight you. I'm not scared."_

_"I didn't say you were." he replied quietly, still unused to speaking. It bothered him, for some reason, that just the vibrations on his throat from using his voice were strange, and found he was having trouble swallowing. He didn't know why._

_I don't know anything, he thought. Why don't I know anything?!_

_"I know who you are." she said detachedly, eyes running anxiously up and down his sculpted form._

_"Who am I?" he asked, desperation straining his voice, and then looked away, up at ceiling, ashamed of how suddenly and eagerly he had asked._

_"You are the Winter Soldier." she replied, taking one cautious step closer to him. "You have been committing assassinations for HYDRA since 1943. You are the single greatest factor in the reshaping of the world. You will bring freedom."_

_He cringed. That didn't sound like him. Well, no- it sounded exactly like what he had woken up thinking, and that must be him, since it was the first thing he had known, but somewhere in the back of his mind it sounded so fundamentally..._ wrong

_"Is that all you know about me?" he asked, looking down at her. He didn't know anything, maybe, and that wasn't much to go on, but she was so small and HYDRA was so dangerous and rigidly disciplined and frightening. Surely she shouldn't be here._

_She nodded. "That is all I've been told."_

_"They tell you things?"_

_"Yes."_

_"Always?"_

_"As far as I remember."_

_"How long have you been here?"_

_"Since I was six years old. I have heard about you since then."_

_He glanced over his shoulder, and since no one was watching, went down on one knee so he was closer to her height. It was a vulnerable position, open to attack, but he did it anyway._

_"I don't know anything." he confessed, out loud. It was both terrifying and exhilarating, simultaneously. "I can't remember anything. They keep you here, and I think they keep me here too, so if you see me, and I don't remember you, remind me of who I am. Please."_

_She was staring at him, frozen, and his brows tightened in worry. "Can you do that- Look, what's your name?" He had unconsciously switched to English; American English, with a distinct accent. The little girl in front of him bit her lip, memorising that voice for later._

_"My name is-"_

_"Romanov!"  snapped a harsh voice, and they both twisted sharply towards its source. There was a man in riot gear, including a helmet with a reflective visor and a bulletproof vest, standing in the doorway, with other similarly-clad soldiers behind him._

_His shielded head turned from one of them to the other slightly, as he glanced at them both, and the Winter Soldier stood up awkwardly._

_The man started to march forward, his body language angry, and the tiny assassin took a step away from the Winter Soldier, towards him, alarm showing in her face as she paled slightly._

_"You were meant to report back ten minutes ago," he growled, completely ignoring the Winter Soldier. "Where were you?"_

_"I'm sorry," she replied, eyes submissively downcast. "I was fighting with one of the new agents, as ordered."_

_"You were talking to this man." contradicted her commander sharply. "You are not to waste time."_

_He raised his hand suddenly, and the little girl flinched slightly, and in the space of about a second the Winter Soldier realised that he was wearing weighted gloves and that wouldn't just hurt, it would_ hurt _and his metal arm few up to grab the man's wrist, stopping him._

_The whole world seemed to stop, just for a fraction of a second._

_And then the Winter Soldier let go slowly, glaring at the man and just begging him, silently, to try and hit her again. Obviously it couldn't be seen through the visor, but he imagined he was being stared right back at, maybe a few beads of sweat breaking out on the man's forehead. That image was satisfying, although he didn't know why._

'I don't like bullies' _murmured the voice of what seemed to be a blonde matchstick, through a hazy fog of memories._

 _"She was talking to me because I told her to," he said, his voice still lacking in any particular emotion. "If you want to try and beat_ me _up over that, feel free."_

_The helmeted man didn't move, and most definitely did not hit her, and the Winter Soldier nodded, far more calmly than his inner turmoil would suggest was possible. "Good."_

_And he walked away._

_That wasn't the last time he saw her._

_It broke Natasha's heart a little that he didn't even recognise her once, and yet each time he did see her, he cared._

 

 Her room here looked like a very small one bedroom apartment, with no kitchen, living room or any other area. There was a bed, in a slightly sheltered corner next to a window (which presumably the tank-proof one that Fury had warned her about), and a bathroom across from it. The area in the middle was empty space, bar a single carpet.

Steve winced a little, one hand reaching up to rub the back of his neck. "...Yeah, it's a bit bare. You sure you don't want any books or anything?"

She shook her head, the knot in her throat too tight for her to speak. This room couldn't be hers. It was huge, luxurious. Bedrooms, or quarters, or cells, for her, were functional; she slept in them, woke up, and then started her day according to other people's orders.

"Are you alright, Natalie?" asked Clint from behind her, his voice gentle, and she forced herself to swallow.

"Yes," she said, her voice only shaking a tiny bit. "Of course." No weakness, she reminded herself. He's kind, but he is still a soldier.

"Ok." he replied, just trying to confirm that if she was ok, it was ok. Maybe she picked up on that, maybe she didn't. He couldn't tell. "Those two dweebs'll still be outside your door, and it'll be locked."

"Obviously," she shot back. "Otherwise I would get out."

Clint's eyebrows jumped up, but she gave him another one of those odd little smiles, and he smirked, relieved. She was joking: that had to be a good thing. Joking was normal twelve year old behaviour, right?

"Are you hungry?" he asked, and she shook her head again. There was that unpleasant tingling feeling in her belly, perhaps, but that wasn't real hunger. She had gone days without food before.

"Alright. Uh... goodnight, then, I guess." he finished limply, backing out of the room with another gentle touch to her shoulder. This time, she didn't jump, and he felt a little glow of victory.

Natasha didn't move, just listening to the sound of the door closing and locking, and then receding footsteps. And then there was nothing to listen to, and she still didn't move.

What were you supposed to _do_ in a room like this?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have deja vu from the ending of previous sections.  
> And no originality whatsoever.  
> I apologise.  
> Next chapter coming soon!


	6. Of Disney and Thunderstorms

Thunder broke the silence of the night, and she sat bolt upright, waking with a start. She couldn't remember where she was, just for a few seconds, and the thunder could be an explosion, a gunshot, a tank-

Lightning crackled next to her window, where she had left the curtain partially open, and she recoiled from it violently, seeing only electricity jumping between the old machines that they had showed her, that HYDRA had been using since World War Two and still used sometimes; the ones like twisted metal skeletons out of steampunk nightmares, the ones that she knew were used on the Winter Soldier, when he made mistakes, to improve him, that even in his most vacant, impassive moments he feared.

Past and present flashed before her eyes, in perfect time with the lightning, and when the thunder sounded again she leapt back, stumbling out of bed and kicking at the suddenly oppressive weight of the covers to get them away.

It's not real, she told herself, standing and shivering in the middle of the empty room. It happened a long time ago. SHIELD is playing nice, for now, and I'm being _good_ , I haven't done anything to warrant being corrected - apart from that blunder in the gym, but they don't know about that -

Another white-hot strike split the air, and she heard a whimper slip past her lips as any idea of a rational thought dissolved and she collapsed into terror and impulse, shoulders hunching protectively and eyes screwing shut.

At the next crash of thunder, Natasha bolted for the door, small fists and shoulder colliding hard with it, but not hard enough for it to budge. She shouted wordlessly, furious at the obstruction, and took a step back. Previously, she had been wearing a standard SHIELD combat uniform, albeit a smaller version, but even SHIELD expected its agents to have their own pyjamas, and so she was dressed in someone's baggy, soft pyjama bottoms that had been shrunk in the wash and a huge grey t-shirt, which was lucky because when she raised a leg to kick down the lock she could easily move and gather enough force that the handle practically broke off. Outside, the two guards had drawn their guns, but she barrelled into the first one and sent him flying, onto his back, and the other one promptly had his legs kicked out from him and his pistol dismantled and thrown away by what appeared, to him, to be an angry red and grey blur.

And then she was running down the hall, all the doors becoming identical in the semi-darkness, lost and tired, adrenaline pumping through her veins. She made approximately ten seconds worth before alarms began to sound, red lights suddenly flashing, and another thunderbolt joined in the noise and it was too much, too much sound, and her coordination disappeared. Someone screamed in frustration - it might have been her, she didn't know - and she stumbled backwards into another door, sobbing, and slammed her head back against it.

She hadn't been meaning to knock, but a second later she heard and felt the door unlocking, and there was a baffled-looking but very much awake Clint standing there, staring at her with wide, confused eyes.

"Natalie?" he asked, having to yell to be heard over all the conflicting sounds around them, and she shook her head, terrified of what might happen as a result of her emotional outburst, but unable to stop. It was like a dam had broken in her mind and everything was spilling over.

"Natasha!" she shouted back him, tears making her vision unclear, her body beginning to tremble. "My name is Natasha, please, I'm sorry I lied, I-!"

"What is it?" he asked loudly, looking around for the danger she was running from and glancing behind him to check that his bow was in reach. "I'm not mad at you, ok? What is it?"

" _Groza._ " she replied, voice little more than a breath and barely audible under the alarms. She doubted that Clint spoke Russian, but he nodded anyway, understanding.

"The storm? I couldn't sleep anyway, come on."

He gathered her up in his arms, gentle and supporting, and she felt ridiculous, she was far too old for this, and she didn't need looking after, she was _the Black Widow_... but most of all, she felt _safe_ , and she didn't protest, and he didn't say a word when she folded her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, despite the fact that they both knew she could kill him instantly in this position. If she had met him first, back at the facility, instead of Steve, she wouldn't even have hesitated to dispatch him.

But she didn't.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, resting her head on his strong shoulder. "For the gym, and this too. And also biting you that one time. I don't mean to get you in trouble, I swear."

"I'm not in trouble," he whispered back, walking around and further into his apartment. It was much bigger than Natasha's room, with more personal belongings strewn untidily around, and a TV opposite his couch. "And you don't need to apologise to me, kiddo. Director Fury's in charge here, not me, and he's used to me pulling all kinds of shit."

"But, I-"

"No, I don't want to hear it. You're not in trouble, and I'm not either."

She nodded shyly. "If you say so, Agent Barton."

Clint smiled reluctantly. He'd be damned if that chilly, lilting voice wasn't still scary coming out of a child's mouth, but it wasn't like she could help it. "Hey, while I'm on break, my name is Clint. Want to watch a film or something? Agent Coulson lent me his Disney/Pixar collection."

"Who's Coulson?"

Clint chuckled. "He's the guy in charge of making sure I don't mess up too bad."

She nodded, face grim, and Clint clarified quickly. "He's not scary or anything, though! I mean, he's a 'responsible adult' and everything, but he has a Disney collection."

 

Clint made sure to keep his attention focused on her, just in case, but she was simply acting like a frightened little girl for whom the world had become suddenly a little too much to deal with. He wondered for what a moment what would have happened, if she had allowed herself to do this at HYDRA, and a horrible image of her crying uncontrollably, forgotten in a corner, filled his mind. He shook his head to get it out and put her down gently on his sofa.

"Why don't you go through them and see if there's one you like the look of?" He doubted that she had ever seen any of the films before. It was possible, though. Not likely, but possible. Nothing was impossible, his time at SHIELD had taught him. "I'll go find Coulson or Fury or Steve, tell them to turn off the alarms. Ok?"

She looked down and began to bite her lip a little, nodding, and Clint's eyebrows shot up. "I don't _have_ to. What's up?"

"Nothing."

He paused, thinking of what it was she might be afraid to say, and why she might be afraid to say it (while Natasha rubbed away the tiredness and drying tears from her eyes), and then said, "You know, there aren't any cameras in here either. I get sick of them."

One corner of her mouth quirked slightly in a bitter little smile. "I don't believe you." she half-murmured, and then sighed. "They won't let me just stay here." she explained, more loudly. "I'm dangerous."

"Well," he replied thoughtfully, trying to work out whether she was right or not. "It's either tell them and take that chance, or not tell them and watch them burst in here, all guns blazing."

Natasha shrugged, assuming a desensitized face again, and looked up to stare into the wall behind the TV, instead of the carpet, with her dangerous green eyes. Clint just waited for her to reply, and she waited for him to stop waiting, and he stood perfectly still and she drew each knee up slowly to her chest and wrapped her arms leisurely around them.

"I guess... The alarms have got to go off sooner or later." she admitted eventually, voice something of a reluctant grumble. Clint beamed.

"I'm just going to be a moment. I promise they won't make you do anything, alright?"

She just sent him a stare that was not only devoid of feeling, but devoid of hope, and he backed out.

 

Once he was in the corridor again, surrounded by the blare of the alarms and the flashing red lights again - he hadn't been lying when he said pretty much every door in SHIELD was soundproof - Clint started jogging in the direction of Director Fury's office, well aware of the fact that at some point soon he was probably going to be met with Fury, Phil Coulson, Maria Hill and every other agent that SHIELD was able to muster. Really, he was surprised it hadn't happened yet.

Brows furrowing slightly in concern, Clint glanced behind him, rounding a sharp corner and-

OOF! Slammed straight into Coulson. As he had guessed, there was a substantial team following him, mostly with their weapons already drawn and loaded, and surprisingly few still in their pyjamas. Fury wasn't wearing anything even mildly embarrassing, noted Clint disappointedly, instead opting for his usual black leather trenchcoat. He hadn't even deigned to put on the fuzzy bear-foot slippers that Clint had brought him last Christmas.

"Y'know," he quipped cheerfully, wrapping an arm around Phil as the other man tried to pull away from him. "If you wanted to get closer, you could have just asked."

"Stop flirting, Barton." barked Fury. "We have a code red situation."

"No," drawled Clint, finally letting go of his fellow agent. "Actually, she's watching cartoons."

Coulson raised an eyebrow in question, and Fury glared at him, apparently trying to work out what exactly was going on simply by sheer force of optic power.

"Are you going to explain yourself," he asked, eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Or am I going to have to force you?"

"It was the storm." explained Clint quickly. "She got scared, ran to the nearest thing she knew."

"It's a trap." pronounced the Director immediately. "She's acting."

Clint began to shake his head, but Phil interrupted him before he could speak. "Clint, I know you're trying to be kind, but she's not a baby."

"She's emotionally stunted, probably traumatised. I wouldn't know precisely, I'm not an expert." He ran a hand through his short hair, trying to force his brain to work. "And I don't know about you, but I wasn't exactly an adult at twelve years old. Those vintage Captain America cards would suggest you weren't either."

Nick Fury was still shaking his head, and now he was smiling patronisingly. Clint turned to stare right back at him.

"You've got cameras everywhere, for god's sake! Check the tapes."

"She could still be acting." insisted Fury grimly.

"Go and see for yourself! I would bet you _anything_ she's still curled up on my couch, poking through a pile of DVDs. And turn off the alarms!"

Fury smirked at him, but raised one hand and made a small gesture, and they cut out immediately. Clint exhaled slowly, relieved, waited first for Nick to take the lead. He fell into step beside Coulson, far more relaxed, and glanced at him in question.

"Where's Steve? Looks like you got everyone else up."

"Captain Rogers is asleep." admitted Coulson, with a small head-nod.

"Through all that?" laughed Clint, and Coulson smiled at him.

"He says he lived in a tiny, thin-walled apartment in Brooklyn for years, plus an orphanage, a war, a tent full of showgirls, and Bucky Barnes once shared a bunk-bed with him, and that he has therefore developed selective hearing."

Clint nodded, remembering the time that Fury had decided to test everyone's reaction times and blood pressure by getting a team to dress up all in black and pretend to perform a midnight raid, and he (like everyone else) had screamed at the top of his lungs and (unlike everyone else) climbed into the rafters, refusing to come down, while the rest of SHIELD panicked around him. Steve had woken up in the morning, perfectly well-rested, and asked why all the rookie agents were shuddering over mugs of coffee, shock blankets wrapped around their shoulders.

 

Natasha had leaned forwards, onto her knees, and was currently frowning determinedly at the films. While it was true that she had never heard of either _Frozen_ or _Monsters Inc,_ they both looked equally confusing and intriguing. And the alarms had turned off while she was still not back in her room, so at least she probably wouldn't have to kill anyone to keep them away from her.

Concentrating very hard on the collection of movies, Natasha picked up _Brave_ , which had a red-headed girl and a bear on the cover, as well as a sticky note that said 'Clint = Wannabe Merida', and so seemed very interesting, and weighed it up in her mind against _The Princess and the Frog._ She had almost immediately disregarded _Tangled_ , since there seemed to be a disturbing amount of pink on the cover.

The door clicked open, softly and non-urgent, and she decided quickly on _Brave_.

"Clint, I think-"

She glanced up as she said it, and froze at the sight of a stern, angry-looking Nick Fury and a whole host of menacing others... and no Clint.

"Well," asked the Director sardonically, spreading his arms out in question. "What do you think, _Natasha_ _?_ "

She put it back down on the pile, a horrible sinking feeling in her stomach. For a moment then, she had actually believed that she would be allowed to watch a Disney film with Clint. It had been dumb of her, but still. She had believed it.

Natasha unfolded her legs from under her and stood up slowly, body language tense but unthreatening. She considered whether or not to put her hands up in surrender, or out for cuffs, and then crossed her arms over her chest protectively, inclining her head at Fury like a bird.

"I think that _Brave_ looks like a better movie than _Tangled_ _,_ and that you're going to lock me back up now." she said evenly, her voice quiet.

"It is!" came Clint's voice, and he shouldered his way into the picture from behind a blonde woman with a rifle who, along with the small doorway, had cut off his view of Natasha and vice versa. "But _Tangled_ is good too. And, um, you don't have to go back-"

"You don't have to go back," continued Fury, smiling tightly. "So long as we can confirm that you're not a threat."

He made a gesture to the agents to stay where they were, and strode forwards, towards her. With every step she became more rigid, but she stood her ground, the only real reaction to his approach the way her jaw clenched and her chin tilted upwards.

Natasha swallowed hesitantly, and checked the way he was looking at her. She had been painstakingly taught this; it was like a trick, or a doublebluff. Manipulate the manipulators. Wring information out of those interrogating you.

There. Either she worried him, or he was worried for her, a little.

"You could make sure I wasn't hurting anyone if you stayed." she offered, unmoving. She had trained herself not to even blink, in the correct environment. "I am under no one's orders to do so, so I'm not. _Sir._ "

The last word was added just out spite - it was childish, really, she shouldn't have done it - but Fury just scoffed and turned away, and she sagged in relief.

"Watching _Brave_ with a pair of assassins?" he asked Clint, eyebrows so far up that if he had a hairline, they would have disappeared into them. Clint, Natasha and Phil waited with bated breath. He smirked. "I've done weirder things. You two, siddown, Agent Coulson, set it up, the rest of you: clear off."

Those who were used to his methods of operating promptly did as they were told, but Natasha's eyes widened and she didn't move. He pointed a finger at her, making her jump slightly.

"I thought I just said 'sit down'?"

Her eyes narrowed even as she hurried to do so, huddled right into the corner, one arm wrapped around her knees, and she glared at him.

"Jab your finger in my face again and I break it."

"I'd like to see you try. Anyone got any popcorn?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ha! Fluff! Didn't see that coming, didya?  
> (IT WON'T LAST, THE ANGST WILL SOON RETURN)


	7. Love is For Children

They had spent about three hours watching _Brave_ , since Natasha had been completely transfixed and it was hilarious to see - Clint had snapped a picture with his iPhone, and then had Coulson whispering in his ear about what he was and was not allowed to disclose, which in English meant 'put that on the internet and I swear to god...' - so they had played it twice, with Clint murmuring Fury's name every time the bear appeared, hissing 'It's yoooou' at Phil whenever Merida's mother spoke and screaming 'ME' at every single occasion that Merida used a bow. He even reached across to tap Natasha on the shoulder and tell her that she reminded him of the twins, much to her chagrin.

When it finished for the second time, the time was exactly twenty one minutes past six, and Coulson sent a begrudgingly bemused glance at Fury. "I hate to be the only adult in the room, but there has to be a staff meeting about last night in an hour and nine minutes. And all our equipment has gone haywire because of the storm."

Fury nodded curtly, standing up, and scowled as his bones proceeded to give him hell for doing so too quickly. Next to him, Natasha shifted sleepily and yawned, and Clint grinned.

"Someone needs more sleep." He teased, prodding her in the ribs and ignoring completely the fact that she didn't even twitch in reaction. "That's what you get if you decide to wake up the whole intelligence agency at three in the morning, though."

"I don't need more sleep." she replied, a warning edge to her voice. "I've had less than that. It's fine."

Clint 'hmm'ed, feeling bad for her again - not that she'd understand the sentiment, when all she had stated was pure fact - and rolled his shoulders, before following Phi and Fury's lead and standing up too.

"I don't need to attend this thing too, do I?"

Coulson nodded, picking up his blazer from where he folded it neatly on one of Clint's chairs, which was, incidentally, piled high with dirty laundry. "Actually, you do. It shouldn't last long, it's just standard procedure for a drill like this."

Clint mouthed the words 'Standard procedure' melodramatically, like a bitter ten year old girl, and stood up. "Hey, where's Natasha going to go?"

"Good point." mused Coulson, a slight frown appearing between his brows. "No offence, but we can't leave you alone."

She shrugged. "I'm not offended. I'd steal your secrets and use them against you."

"Cap?" suggested Fury, and the pair of them nodded.

"I'll drop her off?" offered Clint, and the two superior agents exchanged a somewhat hesitant look before hurrying away to deal with the mess that the pair of assassins had caused.

"C'mon," he murmured, yawning loudly and pulling on a hoodie to make himself look semi-organised- or, at least, to appear a little less like he was still in his pyjamas, which he was. "You can hang with Stevie for a few hours; someone'll probably drop off today's agenda for the pair of you after that. _I've_ got to go and pretend to be an adult."

She was staring at him with some nervousness and frustration under her usual stony mask, and so Clint just smiled awkwardly and tried to make another joke. She hadn't moved.

"Hey, do you want me to carry you again?"

Natasha looked away from him. "Shut up."

"You ok?"

"Shut up! Can..." She faltered, making an aggravated noise in her throat and covering her face with her hands. "Can you just pretend like last night never happened?"

Her words were muffled by her hands, and spoken shyly. But she was asking things, making demands, and surely that was a _good_ thing?

"Why would you want to do that?" he asked, concerned, and sat down gently across from her. Last night she had been terrified of everything equally, and that made her brave in a way that she was usually not. Now, however, she was back to her usual modus operandi: brave enough to kill a man in cold blood, frightened of the people who ordered her to pull the trigger.

"Because it was a weakness!" She flung her hands away from her face, balling them on the material of the couch. "I can't- I mean, it's not ok to-"

Sudden realisation dawned on Clint, and he felt like an idiot. She hadn't been herself at three in the morning. The storm had driven her out of her mind with terror and she had behaved in a way that - while perfectly normal for any other kid her age, or maybe a few years younger - was completely unacceptable to her.

"We all have weaknesses! I..." He mentally searched for one that she couldn't use to kill him on the spot. "I love dogs. Someone could strap a bomb to a dog, and chances are I'd pet it anyway. Everyone has weaknesses like that, it's ok."

"No. It's not." She looked at him as though he was stupid. "They're _weak_. They can be exploited. Captain Rogers has a weakness for innocent looking little girls, probably old ladies too, and I nearly managed to kill him with that knowledge."

He shrugged. "Well, you were weak this morning, and I didn't use it against you."

She looked away, and he got it. That was what she didn't understand.

"Because you were under orders not to...?" she suggested, unsure, and he shook his head.

"No, Natal-  Natasha. We're friends, ok? You- accidentally, I know, but still, you trusted me, and I trusted you. That's how friends work."

It felt weird, having to explain this to someone. This was just something that people _knew_ , but where would she have ever learned it?

"And sometimes friends do weird shit together, like watching _Brave_ twice, consecutively, at an ungodly hour. Why else would I do that with you?"

"Because you were under orders." she insisted, and he felt the sudden urge to headbutt everyone at HYDRA.

"But I'm not! Steve was ordered to watch you; I'm just along for the ride."

She looked at him, her blank mask gone and her face strangely open. "Really?" All kinds of emotions were flickering across it, and he nodded all too eagerly.

"Really, I swear."

He sighed, trying to keep his emotions inside. After all of SHIELD's training, it should have been easier than it was.

"C'mon. Steve'll be getting worried, and I'm needed at the meeting."

 

*

 

Steven Grant Rogers was still asleep. Contrary to popular opinion, he didn't rise at dawn, say the pledge of allegiance, smile patriotically and spent the next fourteen hours loving America, before having freedom for dinner and falling asleep dreaming of the founding fathers. Most of the time he would roll out of bed at ten. Unless there were bad guys to kill, of course.

So when they arrived at his door and knocked, he was still lying face down on his bed, limbs sprawled out in a habit from his skinny days - and didn't that just annoy the hell out of Bucky, when the nights were especially cold and they shared a bed to stop either man freezing to death - and he yelped and nearly elbowed himself in the face as he woke up.

"Huh? Who is it?" he called, careening off the comfortable surface and wincing at the chill as he searched frantically for a pair of pants. His room was considerably neater than Clint's, (although that wasn't hard) with a neat stack of books next to his bed. There was a similar pile of magazines on his desk, along with CDs and DVDs, and his computer was set to open up various Twitter, Tumblr, YouTube and Facebook pages every time he clicked on the internet. He nearly understood everything, at a surface level. Nearly.

"It's me and Nat," called Clint's unmistakable tones. "Your turn to babysit, Cap!"

 Steve rolled his eyes at Clint's painful ignorance- or at least, what he perceived to be Clint's painful ignorance. _Why the hell can't that man just be sensitive around her, just for once?_

"Just a second!" he called back, pulling another t-shirt over his head. Someone (presumably Coulson) seemed to have gone out of their way to buy him about a hundred identical tight white t-shirts. _It wasn't like SHIELD haven't had my measurements for the last seventy years_ , he thought grumpily. _Why is everything I own a little too tight?_

He opened the door and smiled gently, taking a moment for his eyes to remember that people were generally smaller than him now, and glance down to where Natasha was standing half-behind Clint. She hesitated, and then smiled back, and he blinked, surprised.

"Hey, Natalie."

"My name is Natasha." she corrected quickly, like a machine, and Clint explained.

"Misunderstanding slash probably-straight-out-lie. We've got it covered now, though. Natasha, me, Coulson and Fury watched _Brave_ this morning! At, like, three!"

Steve's eyebrows came together, confused, and he opened his mouth to question it, and then closed it again with a shrug.

Some things in this world are just meant to be confusing.

"You want to come in, then? I haven't really got any kid's films yet- _Brave_ 's a kid's film, right, Clint?"

"Yup! Still good for adults, though."

"Agent Barton's presence is required at a meeting." Natasha clarified coldly. "There was a security breach early this morning."

Steve put two and two together, and for once in this strange new future, the answer wasn't five.

"That was you?"

"Yes."

"Both of you, or-"

"Just me. I may have also injured those two bodyguards." She looked semi-guilty, but also like she didn't know why she was meant to feel bad about it. The thing that struck Steve the most was how she didn't look afraid, and her tone as she said it was not at all defensive.

"Alright."

Clint nodded gratefully at him as she slipped inside, bounced on the balls of his feet for a moment, otherwise stationary, and then turned to join a group of agents heading in the direction of the conference room. They looked like they probably knew what they were doing, dressed in professional-ish clothes and carrying clipboards, and so Clint would probably be fine.

Natasha, meanwhile, wandered inside and surveyed the contents of the apartment critically. It was less alien to her than Clint's untidy, expansive living area; the rigid discipline of someone used to being a soldier for far too long, and clinging to it.

It was nothing like the Spartan cells were she had been kept, of course. There were even two framed photographs on his dresser.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Steve turn around and watch her, but she ignored it. One thin, small hand reached out to pick the first photograph up: it was of a woman, in black and white, with neatly coiffed hair and a wide, genuine smile, her lips painted a bright colour. She wore an army uniform, and her dark eyes were focused on some point behind the photographer, although the photo was clearly being taken professionally or for some professional purpose.

The other one was taken in almost precisely the same manner, although this time, Natasha didn't reach to pick it up and angle it towards her own meagre eye-level. A young man in the same uniform was sitting awkwardly on a chair, his hands folded on his lap, and staring straight into the camera, a slight smirk playing over his lips. His eyes - which even in the grainy, monochrome picture were clear and striking - were laughing, and some of his dark hair escaped the slicked-back style to hang over his forehead.

She looked into those laughing eyes, and for some reason imagined them haunted and dead, and his happy, slightly uncomfortable expression screaming, pleading for help, and she froze.

That was the Winter Soldier.

She glanced over her shoulder, eyes suddenly blazing. "Who is that?" she demanded, voice cracking. "How do you know him?"

Steve, who had drawn a few steps closer to her, put his hands up defensively, expression worried. "Hey, calm down."

"Tell me. _Now._ "

Her hands had balled into fists as she stressed the last word, and Steve's eyes flickered around the room briefly, checking for unconcealed weapons. Whatever had happened between her and Clint yesterday, she was still dangerous.

"Natasha. Calm. Down. That's..." He looked away. "That's my friend. Or, he used to be my friend. We grew up together."

"That photo was taken during the Second World War." she pointed out, still staring him down.

"Yeah." sighed Steve, and sat down on a beanbag that someone had very thoughtfully gotten him. "Look, it's a long story. Did anyone ever tell you about Operation Rebirth?"

"No," she snarled, finding herself suddenly frustrated."But you'd better explain it." There wasn't any time for long stories- HYDRA still had the Winter Soldier in their possession, and she had known him for two years, and in all that time neither of them had any idea who he was. And this guy did, and he wouldn't just _tell her_.

"I was born in 1918." he stated, frankly. "I had too many health problems to list. People thought I wouldn't make it out of my teens, and I almost didn't."

She stopped moving, her attention caught by his story. "What happened?"

"Some guy saw me getting beaten up in an alley, which was a fairly common occurrence in those days, 'cos I was probably about your height and not nearly half as strong-" His accent was slipping as he remembered past events, and she realised with a start that it was the same accent as the one that the Winter Soldier had when he spoke English. "And he said 'you're pretty brave, kid, want to join the army?'. Now, this was 1943, so I was twenty five, and I'd been turned down when I tried to join up before, on account of my physical condition. So, I said yeah." He paused, and flashed a quick smile at the girl, who seemed almost transfixed. "And they injected me with five vials of... _stuff_ , I don't know. They called it the super-soldier serum. It turned me into this big guy, really tall, with a load of muscles that weren't there before, but it fixed up my eyesight, my hearing, my asthma too, everything. Physically, I'm a lot better off than a normal human.

"It didn't make me immortal, though. This was still 1943, so long story short, I'm serving active duty in Europe and my plane gets shot down. And I go down with it."

"What happened?" her voice was quiet, like she was trying not to break the spell.

"I crashed straight into an iceburg. Something in the serum, plus the cold, and I was cryogenically frozen for seventy years. They found me in 2012."

"And what about him?" she continued, something of her usual steel coming back into her voice. As she said it, she twisted vaguely around and glanced at the photo of James Buchanan Barnes that Steve had on his dresser.

Steve half-ignored the question though, in favour of standing up to stare at her cheek. "Is that a bruise? Jesus Christ, that's huge, how did you get that?"

She jumped and covered it quickly with a hand, trying to draw attention away from herself. "Just answer the question, Rogers."

"No, how did you get that?"

She began to bite her lip at his harsh tone, glancing down. "It's not-"

"Natasha!" She visibly startled, and he shut up, flooded with guilt. It struck him suddenly, as it sometimes did, how small she was. "I'm sorry," he began limply, and she shook her head, face hard.

"No. When you left me alone in the gym, I fell. No one saw because Barton took out the cameras."

The words were as rigid as she had become, and the way she stated them so bluntly had Steve looking at her sideways, absolutely perplexed by her behaviour.

"Why didn't you tell anyone?" he asked, almost hesitantly.

"Because I'm not supposed to make mistakes." She made a sharp gesture to cut off whatever he was about to say, whether it was an offer of sympathy or an exasperated explanation of how SHIELD was different to HYDRA. "Yes! I know, it's different here. I know that now. It's ok."

Natasha looked him straight in the eyes, like a challenge. Neither of them were sure if she was challenging Steve's sensibilities, or her own.

"Now tell me about the man in the photo."

Steve nodded slowly, and his gaze slid back to it. "That was my best friend. He was a year or two older than me, with health pretty much as perfect as you could get in a dirty city in the thirties. I used to get myself into fights, and Bucky'd get me out of them."

"That was his name?"

"Yeah. James Buchanan Barnes, Bucky for short."

_Now if I see him again, and he's lost again, I can tell him his name._

"He joined up," continued Steve, with a bitter little smile. "I mean, obviously he did. He was brave and strong, and they let him in a long time before they ever would've let me in. And then one day he went missing, and when we found him again..."

"HYDRA had got him." finished Natasha in an undertone. "I'm sorry."

Steve brushed it off, lost in his thoughts. "You weren't born yet, s'not like it was your fault." He closed his eyes for a moment. "And then, after we rescued him, Bucky fell out of a train."

He cringed as the memory hit him, made even more painful by the knowledge of what had happened to his best friend in all the years after that. "We thought he had died, but he didn't. Instead, they brainwashed him."

"And turned him into the Winter Soldier." she finished, voice thoughtful and full of regret.

"Yeah. You know him." It wasn't a question.

"Yes. We were both HYDRA's project, and we were both assets and assassins. And," She hesitated. Neither her or Bucky had been stupid enough to tell anyone who had power over either of them the precise nature of their relationship, and so no one had ever known what she was about to say to Steve. "A-And, he was... kind to me."

Steve chuckled goodnaturedly. "Yeah, Bucky always was good to dames- Ah, I mean, ladies. Girls."

"I'm sorry for all that has happened to him." offered Natasha softly.

Steve shook his head. "We can't do anything to change it, though."

She took a step forwards and placed a gentle hand on his forearm, cautiously hopeful.

"Maybe we can help him."

He smiled back at her, to reassure any worries she might still have, and nodded.

"I think maybe we can."

 

*

 The Day Before

_Somewhere cold and dark, deep below an office building on the outskirts of New York, the last of Bucky Barnes's newly found personality submitted to the brainwashing it had just receive, and the last of his face was obscured by frost and condensation as they spread across the plastic screen of the cryogenic unit he had been forced into._

_Above him, the nameless HYDRA agent who had, together with the team of drones behind him, recovered the Winter Soldier, smirked. He had the kind of face easily forgotten or lost in a crowd, and the kind of greedy, scheming personality it is best to avoid._

_"One asset recovered," he hissed, voice as greasy and subtly unpleasant as oil. "One left to find. Only, we know where she is."_

_"Sir," barked a voice, one hand held to a headset to listen to a whispered message. "We have information on where Romanov will be tomorrow."_

_A sinister grin spread slowly over the agent's face._


	8. In Which Everything Shatters

Steve frowned restlessly at the collection of music he had been relegated (forcefully) and told to listen to _or else_. Giving up of making any sense of the titles and the descriptions, – what in the hell was ‘indie’? – he turned to Natasha, who had quite happily made herself at home, and was perched elegantly on the edge of his bed.

“Got any preferences?”

“Musically?” she asked, somewhat distracted. “No. I’m not an expert.”

“Well,” he mused, twisting back around to the lines and piles of CDs and records. “You can hardly know less than me.”

It was all very confusing- and he was pretty sure Nicki Minaj would have been arrested for public indecency when he was a kid.

A moment later, he felt a light tap at his side and jumped – even with his preternaturally advanced senses, he hadn’t heard Natasha getting up and drawing closer – to see her standing at his elbow, surveying them along with him.

She hummed thoughtfully. “I don’t know most of these either. But I used to train to _this_.”

One hand snaked past him and picked up Tchaikovsky’s ‘Nutcracker’. Steve blinked, surprised.

“I didn’t realise they actually- yeah, wow. I have heard of that one.”

She shrugged and turned to place the fairly worn record that she had chosen into the player, before Steve had any chance to object. His eyes followed her carefully, as though he might be able to puzzle her out just by staring.

Only when it began to play did he speak, a little hesitantly. “Natasha? Is it alright if I ask you a question?”

She shrugged, not facing him, and focused on the sound of the music. “You can ask.”

“When I found you, you were in a ballet dress.”

“That isn’t a question.”

He sighed slightly, trying to put what it was precisely he was trying to say into words. “I mean, this is a ballet. And you- I don’t understand, exactly. You’re an assassin, not a ballerina. Right?”

Natasha opened her mouth to reply, and then closed it again, lips pursed and unsure. Flashes of memory danced behind her eyes – _waving goodbye, laughing, to two smiling parents (but they had no faces, or she couldn’t see their faces), and then surrounded by other girls, feet carefully placed in positions, dancing, but why did no one have a face? Everything was hazy, uncertain, shiny and fake- and then she was in a dark room, electrodes on her temples, sobbing into a piece of plastic but too afraid to even beg them to_ stop it _!_ – and she shut them quickly to cut it out.

“I think... I think that maybe they were training me to _think_ I was a ballerina. And then, when they wanted me to, I could be an assassin again.”

She didn’t see Steve’s blanch, but she could practically sense it, and almost smiled at the thought. Almost.

“They can do that?”

“They can convince your friend Bucky to work for them on and off for seventy years.” she pointed out calmly. “Make him forget everything he’s ever been.”

Behind her, Steve turned away and sat down on the bed, running his hands through his hair. Just speaking to Natasha about anything seemed to have the possibility to become emotionally draining.

She just concentrated on the music. The record itself was a little grainy, and it clicked as it was played, but the sound of the music was unmistakable and she turned slowly around to it in a kind of thoughtless, disjointed pirouette. Maybe the memories were fake, but it was familiar to her, and it served its purpose as comfort food.

Steve just watched her, and then half-jumped as someone knocked sharply on the door. It wasn't Clint, or he would have either shouted or just walked in unannounced; it wasn't Fury, or he would _definitely_ have just strolled in without warning or explanation; and it wasn't Coulson or Sam, because the knock would have been more friendly and less cursory. Still, this was an intelligence agency, and it was unsurprisingly full of unfriendly, formal, deadly people.

It could have been anyone, really.

He walked over to the door, opening it with an obligingly curious look on his face, prepared to listen. The man at the door, however, had other ideas.

Without warning, there was a gun in Steve's face and he reacted instinctively, ducking and moving, one arm flying up to knock the gun down out of the intruder's hand. Steve was fast, but the man - he was dressed all in black, with no logos, so HYDRA; he had to be HYDRA - was almost as fast and his knee jerked forwards and into Steve's gut as the Captain ducked. Grunting as the air was driven out of him, and with exertion, Steve lunged forwards and tackled him, the fight deteriorating quickly into blows with fists, which was good because the physical strength of Captain America was practically legendary.

Natasha, meanwhile, ha taken a few steps out of the way, her mind racing, and moved straight back into the shell that she had been coming out of: back into what could only be described as _kill mode._

Her eyes scanned quickly over the apartment, with its forcefully modern tech everywhere, its militaristic tidiness, and rumpled bed covers where Steve had been forced to get up too suddenly. There. On the bed, she could see a slight shadow against the pale mattress, under the pillow, and she ran without hesitating over to it, knowing that now was a time that she could not afford to waste under any circumstances. Steve was still handling the HYDRA agent, but he would be coming for her in a second.

As she had suspected, there was a gun. For all his wholesome, patriotic goodness, Steve still knew to keep a gun under his pillow. Well, good. At least he wasn't completely defenceless, underneath all those muscles.

Her body moved instinctively back into the position that it had been taught, pistol held in front of her with both hands, eyes focused without blinking on her target. She suppressed a frustrated snarl - Steve was still in the way, and she didn't want to shoot him, never mind what she would have done all of twenty four hours ago - and waited, trying to aim at somewhere vital on the HYDRA agent.

Finally, she got a clear shot, and squeezed the trigger calmly, loading two bullets into the stranger's shoulder and making him howl with pain.

"Drakov!" yelled the agent, his teeth gritted in pain. "Drakov!"

Natasha gasped and froze on the spot, her form beginning to tremble, and Steve's concerned glance towards her was all the assassin needed to twist around and snap his leg around Steve's neck, choking the super soldier and holding him in place as he kicked and struggled.

Natasha's world had gone numb, and her hands moved down unfeelingly to her sides, the gun slipping through her fingers to clatter to the floor. Steve had no idea what was going on, but the words had clearly triggered something in her brain. Maybe they'd implanted it, maybe she was just messed up. It could easily be either.

"N- Ah! Natasha!" he choked out, reaching up to twist the assassin's arm the wrong way and loosen his grip. There was no answer: her entire face had gone pale and blank in a far different way to how it usually did. Usually it was forced, as a coping mechanism, and now it was open and still completely emotionless, and that was heartbreakingly scary.

Another man appeared behind Steve and his assailant, in the same black uniform, and raised a tranquilliser gun at the little girl who was standing, shaking, in the middle of the room. Her eyes finally focused, but she didn't move other than to swallow hard and then-

A dart shot out of the barrel, silent but for the hiss of air, and for Steve time seemed to slow down as it sped towards her and she didn't move, she wasn't moving. But then, all of a sudden, she twisted, her head and shoulder snapping to the left and out of the way of the dart, which otherwise would have pierced her neck. By the look of it, it was all a hundred percent instinctive, too deeply implanted in her system for her to even have to process it.

Apparently annoyed by his failure to take her out so easily, the other HYDRA agent ran forwards, locking his gun to the holster on his back and, ignoring as Natasha stumbled back, afraid and half-blinded by fear and whatever the word 'Drakov' had sent coursing through her brain, grabbed both of her arms and held them behind her back. The one fighting Steve finally managed to draw a small knife out the holster on his leg and press it to Steve's throat, and Natasha, mouth partially open and eyes wide, forced herself to blink and sent her gaze trailing hazily from one man to the other.

"No." she said, voice faint, and the agents actually stopped, exchanging a surprised glance.

"I- _don't_." she begged them.

"You are not giving us orders, Romanov." growled the one holding her arms. He was speaking Russian, and she responded automatically in the same language.

"I am not. Captain America is SHIELD's strongest single asset, but I have information on him that we can use if they try to use him. Take him out now, and they develop stronger areas."

"He doesn't seem too strong to me." pointed out the one with the knife.

Natasha scoffed slightly, cool and relaxed. "No. Because he protects those he perceives as weak. Children, like me."

"If you are wrong." warned her captor. "Agent _Adin_ will make you pay."

She nodded slightly, and he pulled the gun off his back and shot Steve straight in the cartroid artery , with perfect aim. There was nothing but darts full of sedative loaded into it, apparently.

The last thing that the Captain saw was the way her eyes closed in what was almost dread, dark lashes brushing gently against her pale cheek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> short one! Sorry, just had to end it on a cliffhanger, because I'm kind like that.


	9. Shards of Things

Natasha woke up to the all-too-familiar sound of the whirr of machines, and the familiar sensations of being strapped to a table, and kept perfectly still but for the way the way she bit her lip to keep from sobbing.

She thought she had _escaped_.

Breathing in deeply, she forced herself to relax. _What do I know?_ she asked herself, trying to keep calm. _What do I know for certain?_

She knew that she was back in a HYDRA facility, that they’d want to interrogate her about what had happened, and that life was going to go back to the way that it had been and, soon enough, she would end up like the Winter Soldier or worse: a mindless soldier. They had told her that she would be under the control of Agent _Adin_ too, not that that meant anything, - ‘Adin’ is just Russian for ‘one’ – which presumably meant that he was the man who had taken over after Pierce’s death.

Natasha hadn’t had much contact with Pierce, but she had felt a bittersweet gladness that he had died. He was cruel: she knew that much.

And then she asked herself what she knew for certain about SHIELD, and something inside her broke. She knew that Clint and Steve cared about her, and that Phil Coulson liked kid’s cartoons, and that Fury didn’t mind cuddling people if it was very early in the morning. She knew that they didn’t force people to do things, or not children, anyway, and that they seemed to be the good guys. In relative terms, at least.

 _I have to get back to them_.

With that resolve etched firmly into her mind, she finally allowed her eyes to flicker open. She was being held in what looked almost like a basement, all dank darkness and shadows of pillars, and there were men and women in lab coats or combat gear mulling around another table like the one that she was held to by metal cuffs around her arms and ankles. She could hear the faint sound of murmured notes and queries as the scientists and the soldiers talked amongst themselves, and underneath that, ragged and gulping breaths. Curious and, apart from maybe ten or eleven cameras, unwatched for the moment, she leaned forward a little to try and catch a glimpse of the cause of them and...

Oh no. Sitting with his eyes squeezed shut against the ghost of a pain that he wasn’t sure he could remember, was the Winter Soldier. He glanced at them, confused, as they unstrapped him, and flexed his metal hand. It was a bit of a shock reminder, she thought, his hand. Looking at it, you remembered that he was more than just a damaged man: he was a man crafted into a weapon, with only the last echoing remnants of a good man’s personality rattling around an empty skull.

He still needed rescuing, of course. So did she. And if no one was coming to rescue them, well, they’d just have to rescue themselves.

Eventually, the scientists began to dissipate, – back to their labs and work stations, or whatever it was that they did when they weren’t systematically brainwashing children and prisoners of war – the soldiers and agents of HYDRA wandered over to their posts, and a man sidled out of the gloom and murk and towards Natasha, his fingers steepled and dark glasses sliding down his unremarkable nose to reveal ordinary brown eyes and a plain face. He would have looked harmless, if not for the nauseatingly triumphant smirk plastered across it and his eyes scanned her up and down as he moved closer, making her want to shudder. She didn’t, though. She knew better than that.

“We thought you’d be more trouble than this, Romanov.” he sneered. “SHIELD has been treating you well, by all accounts.”

She blinked, neutral and calm, and back in the headspace that was necessary to survive a confrontation like this. “Why would I cause trouble?”

He just smiled darkly, and waved it off with one hand. “Not important.” Natasha nodded shortly, suddenly hyperaware that she would, before SHIELD, have simply filed that information under ‘not important’ like an obedient little asset and forgotten it. “Have you managed to gather any information during your time with them, at least?”

For the second time, she nodded, and a quick movement in the corner of her eye, or perhaps the light glinting off his arm, drew her gaze back to Buck- no, the Winter Soldier. It was hard to remember not to think of him by that name, now that she knew it.

He had moved forwards abstractedly, empty eyes flickering between her and the man who had been questioning her in concern, and she realised that they must have just wiped him again by the way that his hair was brushed into his face and his scarred chest was bare.

Agent Adin – it had to be him – had tracked her line of vision and scowled, one hand snapping up to her chin and jerking it to the right to force her to look at him.

“You are aware of the conditioning used on the other asset, Romanov?”

She nodded for a third time, still silent. Fury may have been intimidating, but he seemed to actively _encourage_ insubordination, and he had been as kind to her as everybody else at SHIELD. Adin was a threat, and not one that could be neutralised.

At her blank affirmative, he snorted once, in sharp laughter. “They’ve been thinking of doing the same to you. Did you know that?”

Her stomach felt like it was twisting itself into knots at the idea of becoming... like _that_... but she inwardly snapped at it that now was not the time, thank you very much, _izmennik_ , and schooled her expression carefully back to neutral, shaking her head.

“Yet it seems some of our organisation believe that you would be more valuable to us in this form, or maybe one similar to it. Of course, we would be more inclined to believe them if you would be so kind as to prove this worth...?”

_What have I got that they want?_

“I have a catalogued list of SHIELD agent’s weak points.” Her voice was calm as she offered to betray her friends, and she wondered for a moment what she was even doing.

Agent Adin nodded approvingly, and gestured for someone to come over with a notebook and pen. “Good. Begin.”

She took a deep breath and, with the eyes of maybe thirty3 people focused on her, began to tell them how Clint Barton, known as Hawkeye, was terrified of dogs, how Steve Rogers was, actually, not polite or helpful and was actually a backstabbing coward with muscles, how Fury didn’t actually carry any weapons, it was just a myth, and that Phil Coulson had an acute phobia of children’s films.

And the best part was, they swallowed it.

 

*

 

It wasn’t that anyone disbelieved Steve about what had happened. HYDRA incursions had become almost standard detail, as had raids on HYDRA bases – although luckily, in the conflict between the two, SHIELD seemed to be winning – and people were accustomed to their methods.

But they didn’t know how to fix it.

Fury and his agents were looking for HYDRA, of course, and they were searching all the more earnestly in the knowledge that it might save or end Natasha’s life... but, at present, they couldn’t find anything.

Steve and Clint had spent the entire day – from the moments that Clint was told what had happened and Steve woke up – either hanging anxiously around the computer desks and annoying the technicians or slumped exhaustively, depressively over copious amounts of coffee (they weren’t sure if caffeine really affected Steve, but it _seemed_ to help), but eventually something snapped and Clint just slumped tiredly before grabbing his fellow agent by the forearm and dragging him upstairs.

“Clint,” Steve groaned, rubbing a hand over his eyelids where they were still heavy from the after-effects of the sedative that he had been shot with. “Where the hell are we going?”

“Shh.” chided the younger man, a concerned furrow etched between his brows. It had been there all day. “I always do this, when I need to. Coulson’ll know where we are.”

Steve frowned in confusion and allowed himself to be led, still mentally cursing and kicking himself for letting them take Natasha, just like he had let them take Bucky, oh god, he was such an-

“Here.” said Clint abruptly, stopping suddenly in the middle of a hall. There were no rooms or doors anywhere that Steve could see, and he raised an eyebrow at his friend.

“Clint.” he said, vice dry. “Seriously?”

“I am being serious. I’m deadly serious.” The younger looked up at him for a moment and forced a smile, his attention returning in short order to the roof. “Come on.”

“’Come on’ where?”

Clint shifted on the spot for a moment, rolling his shoulders, and then jumped and caught hold of a ventilation grate with both hands and pulled his legs up so that they were tucked under body before quickly kicking up with both of them and letting go. The movement turned into a brief somersault, the grate clattering off somewhere into the vents, and he stumbled a little as he landed and balanced himself. With the grate kicked out of the way, he leapt up again to pull himself through.

Steve almost laughed at him.

“These are the only way to get around, man.” called Clint’s voice, echoing faintly through the metal tunnelling. “Also a good place to hide.”

“What are we going to do up there?” yelled Steve, glancing behind him.

“Eat chips and tell awful jokes! And spy on people.”

“I don’t know. Maybe... couldn’t we be _doing_ something?”

“Leave it to the scientists.” replied Clint, tone resolved. “Once they’ve got a rough location, we’ll be right on it, but we can’t do anything right now.” Steve had a feeling that he had been in situations like this before.

He hesitated, then nodded and followed his friend’s example, gently replacing the grate behind him.

 

 

*

 

“Sir, we’ve got a match!” came the triumphant shout, and one of the technicians stood up suddenly. Within seconds, he was surrounded by every level of SHIELD employee, all of whom were wise enough to make way for Nick Fury.

“That’s New York?” he barked, receiving an answer nod and some furious typing.

“About thirteen floors under a church basement.” confirmed the technician. “They’re hiding, but they’ll know we’re coming.”

Fury, who had been leaning over the man’s shoulders to stare at the computer screen, stood up and began to direct people.

“Everyone, back to stations! Hill, assemble a team. Standard HYDRA protocol: all of you be armed to the teeth, and I _mean it_. Coulson-” He seemed to realise something was missing, and glared fiercely around with his good eye. “Coulson, where in the hell are Steve and Clint?”

The calmer, younger agent smiled tightly. “Just a minute, sir. I’ll get them.”

Pushing past intently busy people, all working and shouting and loading up on a disturbing amount of grenade launchers, Phil hurried upstairs. Clint was like a small and curious monkey, really, only about a thousand times more deadly.

(And he suspected that the poor guy had no coping mechanism. At all. It wasn’t like he’d really been friends with anyone other than Coulson before Steve and Sam turned up, and Phil knew he wasn’t exactly the easiest person to open up to.)

Once he got upstairs, he started walking more gently, careful not to make too much noise. Clint sometimes messed with people by escaping from any sounds he heard while he was in the rafters or the vents.

As he had suspected, the grate was slightly askew and not at all dusty; they had to be up there. Plus, after both the Taco Incident of 2011 (everyone other than Barton, who had caused it, had to have at least level seven clearance to read the file, but speculation was wild and rampant among junior agents) and also several assassinations, Fury had had the vents blocked off so that you couldn’t just crawl between them. The pair of them had to still be in the area too.

Assuming Steve had followed Clint, of course.

“Barton!” he called. “Are you up there?”

There was a moment of silence, and then the muffled sound of footsteps.

“...yeah?”

Coulson allowed himself a brief, satisfied nod.

“Where’s Rogers?”

“Um, I’m here too.”

Steve just sounded awkward. Coulson knew all about what he had gotten up to before the war, of course, partially from personal information conveyed by Clint or Steve himself, and partially just from his file and Agent Peggy Carter’s own records, and so he wouldn’t have put vent-climbing completely beyond Steve, but the super-soldier seemed to have two almost independent mindsets. _Steve Rogers_ was pretty much a different guy to _Captain America_ , and while he was at work, he was Captain America.

“We’ve found her.”

There was only a fraction of a second’s hesitation, and then there was a scuffle of movement and Hawkeye, hair a little messy and chip crumbs on his uniform, dropped down from the ceiling and landed on his feet with only the slightest stumble.

Steve, conversely, lowered himself gently down with just the strength of his arms. Somewhere in the background, Coulson thought he could hear a thousand bodybuilders crying at the mere thought of Steve’s biceps.

“Where?” they both asked, together, and the steel in their voices was so much that it barely even qualified for a question mark.

Coulson said nothing and handed them the brief.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translation!  
> Izmennik = traitor


	10. Reflections on Silence

They dragged her into a little side room when she had finished talking, completely drained of false information, and she collapsed immediately to her knees. Her head throbbed painfully, and she trembled, exhausted, as she buried it in her hands.

  1. barked all the instincts that had been keeping her alive since she was six. _Look about; be aware of your surroundings._



Natasha forced herself to look up, and found nothing more than one of the cells she had come to expect. There were two bunks, one bare, flickering bulb, its wires exposed, and an empty wooden table in the corner.

By the faint, greenish glow of the light, she could just make out a human figure seated on the bottom bunk, but she wasn’t scared. He was wreathed in shadows, but they had locked the door behind her, and so there was only one person that it could be.

Bucky Barnes said nothing and did not move, and she gathered her legs to her chest, faking a little sniffle before pushing herself across the floor and into the corner. She knew that he could be manipulated: she’d done it before. Similar to how she would manipulative Steve if she needed to, she guessed. They were, essentially, two sides of the same coin.

His gaze followed her, glittering blue out of the darkness, and he leaned to the side a little and into the light, his hair falling over his eyes. It was longer than the last time she had seen him, and the shadow of stubble around his jaw was more pronounced. He’d been awake longer than usual.

“You’re usually in cryo.” she whispered, eyes cast down and away from him. She was still watching him out of the corner of her eyes, though, have no fear. “I... I didn’t know you would be here.”

He twitched minutely, his eyebrows coming together for only a fraction of a moment. “I don’t know you...?” he asked, his voice like sandpaper, and she realised with a painful jolt that he must have screamed himself hoarse as they wiped him.

 _She was eleven years old, and dressed in that same goddamned ballet uniform – she_ hated _it, resented it and all that it stood for, not that she could put that hatred into words properly – and standing outside a door that someone had been dumb enough to leave open, head angled so that she could hear what was going on inside._

_“I-“ choked a familiar voice, with that same American accent and that same unsteadiness to it. “No! Get off me- I don’t understand- Let go! Where am I?!”_

_The voice cut out, and she heard footsteps. “Again?” snapped the voice, making her wince. That was Pierce. “He’s playing up_ again _?”_

_“SHIELD’s been active.” was the only reply he received, and he grunted shortly in agreement._

_“Wipe him, freeze him. We’ve been talking about doing something about that troublemaking English politician in a few months, so we can use him then.”_

_She could practically hear the shrug that went with the words, stingingly casual. Didn’t they even slightly understand that they were talking about a man’s fate?_

_“Oh,” added Pierce, somewhat absentmindedly. “You’re going to want to hold him down.”_

_She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to shut out the shouts and sounds of fighting that ensued, but no amount of wishing and praying could block the pained, awful, almost inhuman scream that followed._

“Well,” she huffed, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand, as though she had been crying. The hurt, innocent little girl act seemed to be striking a chord, so she kept it up. “I know you.”

He didn’t reply, trained by long years not to speak, but he frowned, almost desperate for an answer, and she looked him suddenly in the eye.

“You’re the Winter Soldier. You know that much, don’t you?”

He nodded, a little jolted by the way that she had suddenly taken control, but obeying nonetheless.

“You’ve worked for HYDRA for fifty years. You will...” She hesitated, her voice turning bitter. “Bring ‘freedom’.”

He nodded again, more limply. He was disappointed, she realised. He already knew all of this; it was one of the few things he _did_ know.

“Are there cameras?” she said, voice flat. He glanced quickly towards the darkest corner, directly opposite to her, and then nodded once.

“Audio?”

A head shake.

“Then don’t react.” She took a deep breath, and decided that whatever happened now, she would not regret it. “Your name is James Barnes, but everyone who knew you called you Bucky. You fought for America in the Second World War. Against HYDRA.”

His eyes snapped shut and his hands curled into fists where they rested on his thighs, but he was facing away from the camera and so hopefully they didn’t see. She watched his adam’s apple bob up and down, and decided that he was dealing with this as well as he ever would before she continued.

“Your best friend in the world was a man called Steve Rogers.”

Bucky didn’t react. He didn’t know that name- and yet, _he did._

“I’ve met him.” she continued. “He’s coming to help us.” _I hope._

“I don’t need help.” The Winter Soldier’s voice was hesitant, and hardened with the inability to show vulnerability, even for a moment, even to a little girl. This was sensible, really, in the context, because this little girl could kill him twelve ways with a pencil. But, realistically, it was not a good mindset to have.

“I don’t care if you don’t think you do,” she stated, frosty and calm. “I need rescuing. And I’m pretty sure you do too. I’ve met you before, Bucky.”

He startled uncomfortably at the use of his name, and stared at her, for the first time, with hope in his eyes. “Is... Is that really what I’m called?”

“Yes.”

He looked at her from a different angle, but apparently his view of her and her promises stayed the same, because that little light of hope didn’t flicker out. “We’re getting out?”

“Yes.”

He swallowed again, this time over a lump in his throat, and spoke in a croak, a hesitant smile breaking like a sunrise across his features.

“Ok.”

 

*

 

The location was just outside of the city centre, old and decrepit and harmless-looking. In fact, it looked so frail that you might begin to fear for its stability if someone gave it a solid push.

Appearances can be deceiving.

“Reinforced.” whispered the voice of the technician who had found the church in the first place, into the ears of every last man and woman on the team. “No snipers on the outside, no defences behind the door, but no matter how weak that thing looks, it’s practically indestructible. Don’t try to blow it up.”

“I’ve been here before.” added Steve, voice grim. “Bucky’s Ma used to come here all the time, and she dragged us once or twice.”

“I don’t want to be mean,” interrupted Clint, running his hands over the fletching of his arrows. “And I don’t mean any disrespect to the ghost of Winifred Barnes, but right now, Cap, I don’t care. And I also don’t care about what you say, technician guy. I’ll blow this up if I want to.”

“Don’t blow things up!” yelled Fury, far too loud and far too close to his microphone, making them all wince. He was back at SHIELD headquarters and not on the mission, which was probably a good thing given his proclivity for shouting.

“Yessir.” grumbled Clint, but tapped his exploding arrows anyway and winked at Steve, who rolled his eyes.

“That’s enough.” cut Coulson’s clipped, calm tones. “Move into positions.”

Like a switch had been flipped, everyone become very suddenly silent and professional, and all communications went quiet.

“Team A, secure the church. Nothing gets in or out unless it’s working for us.”

Hill nodded shortly at the order and waved a group of soldiers and agents over to her side.

“Everyone else, follow me.”

They moved forwards quickly but steadily, all of them obediently ‘armed to the teeth’ as they had been ordered, and nearly all guns already held in a position to fire.

There was no attack, no sign of life, but instead of relaxing, Steve and Clint only became more anxious. They knew that Natasha was here, but if she was alone did that mean she was dead? Or hurt? Or that it was a trap, or that they were waiting to attack in some other form? Anyone relaxing at all in this situation was, frankly, an amateur.

“Search the place.” continued Coulson sharply, and the technician back at SHIELD apparently agreed with him.

“There’s an elevator below the altar. Should be easy enough to hijack.”

It was, actually. The team who had been ordered to remained in the church, with Maria Hill’s ever-professional self at their head, and the other team (led by Clint and Steve) descended silently into the ground.

They were grateful for the fact that whatever trap there was hadn’t sprung yet, sure, but it still weighed on their minds that it was there _and it was still too goddamn quiet._

Downstairs was different, but they still didn’t relax. They could faintly hear marching and orders in the distance, and they moved forwards as stealthily as they could but in the full knowledge their enemies probably knew they were there and were ready for them, the tension almost tangible in the air. Faintly, Steve heard a ‘twang’ a few times as Clint flicked his bowstring out of habit.

They rounded a corner, every finger on every trigger, every soldier primed for action or orders...

And every one of them froze. Standing in front of them, a rifle raised, in body armour and a mask, was the Winter Soldier.

And behind him was a whole other squad of HYDRA assassins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *laughs evilly*


	11. Safe

“Let me out!”

She couldn’t remember being desperate enough to beg like this; not since she had first been drafted into the Black Widow program and they had locked her up alone in a tiny, dark room, and she had too afraid to breathe and begun to _scream_. And now she was alone again and Bucky was gone, he’d been taken away, and they were going to make him fight and all she could do was hope that he had believed her and what she had told him and that he had remembered enough of it not to obey HYDRA’s orders-

“Anybody! Let me out of here, _please_!

No one answered, but she heard a soft, uneasy shifting of footsteps outside her door, pressed as she was against it.

So she was being watched. Good.

The faintest ghost of a plan sparked in her mind and, with nothing else to go on, she decided that it would have to do.

 

Outside, the guard heard first a slight creaking, and then suddenly a huge crash of metal and metal that made him actually, literally jump into the air and instinctively raise the machine gun that he had been given, stumbling around in something of a nervous panic to face the still-locked door. Behind it, he could hear the girl’s frantic, frightened breaths, and then suddenly a short cry of... relief?

“Fury! T-Thank god you’re here, I-“

How the hell was Nick Fury in there?! It didn’t matter, he decided, but he had to stop them, for the glory of HYDRA-

 

The guard opened the door roughly, struggling for a moment with the lock and fumbling with his gun in his other hand, and hurtled inside, looking around to see...

Nothing. Just the bunkbed – it had been pushed over, which must have been the source of the crash that he had heard – and the darkness. No Nick Fury, and no girl.

Out of the darkness behind him came Natasha, silent and deadly and ruthless. This attack was almost exactly like the technique she had used when she first met Steve – misdirection, and then go for the neck – only this time, she didn’t allow for mistakes.

This time, when she wrapped her legs around his neck, she didn’t wait for him to asphyxiate. She tucked both elbows smoothly under his chin and then jerked up and to the side, snapping his neck, and – no matter who she was really, inside, or who she was willing to become – she felt no remorse as his corpse collapsed limply in a heap before her on the ground and she reached down to pull a pistol from the holster on his leg.

He had been in her way.

All she had to do now was find Steve and Bucky and Clint.

 

*

 

Stuck in a stalemate with his soldiers on one side and the SHIELD team on the other, the Winter Soldier didn’t move, and Steve raised one hand in the universal gesture for ‘wait’ as the assassins on both sides stiffened and prepared themselves to fight.

“Bucky.” he said, voice forcefully level. “Do you-”

Before he even had a chance to finish his sentence, Bucky’s gun was held up to his eye and the sights were set on Steve, and Clint’s bow was drawn up and aimed towards Bucky.

He took a deep breath and tried again. They had to be able to talk through this. They _had_ to. “Look, we don’t want...”

It wasn’t working, he realised, dread settling like a lead weight in the pit of his stomach. Bucky was still standing ready to murder his best friend – he was so, so far from the man he had been when he had joined up in Brooklyn back in the thirties, not to kill people, just because it was _right_ – and this time, there were other people’s lives directly in the balance. Clint’s and those of everyone in the team. He couldn’t afford to be merciful.

With that knowledge, he levelled his own gaze down his gun and stood just as perfectly still as the weapon that had once been Bucky Barnes.

Steve was too focused on their momentary standoff to see what Clint did, since Clint noticed everything. For a moment, no one else saw Natasha as she tore around the corner, shoulders rising and falling rapidly and eyes wide and desperate. Her steps, though uncoordinated and too fast, were practically silent, and he motioned quickly for her to move. If she got caught in this crossfire, he didn’t know if he or Steve would be able to forgive themselves. It was just an addition to the emotionally loaded exchange that this already was.

She caught the gesture and shook her head, eyes hardening. Her childish face was calculating as her soft curls bounced around it, and once again Clint found himself realising that, really, Natasha was anything but normal.

She swallowed, knowing that, for once, she was responsible for the preservation of lives and not their destruction. It was a strange feeling. “Barnes!”

The Winter Soldier spun around to face her in shock, along with most of the HYDRA agents. She didn’t react, other than to pull the pistol she had stolen from her guard from where she had tucked it into her pyjama trousers – oh god, thought Clint, still watching, she was still wearing those too-large pyjamas, she was a little kid and she had a pistol – and point it not at Bucky but at the man next to him, whose face was covered with a balaclava. His teammates hesitated, eyes flickering between the one little girl with a pistol and the squadron of trained killers (they had met Natasha before, though, or at least heard of her, and they knew what she could do) and while they were still hesitating, she loaded two bullets into two skulls.

The memory of the calm and ease with which she performed this – not even flinching away from the blood, her hands not even shaking – would later be all too horrifying to those who had watched.

The movement and the noise seemed to snap the agents of SHIELD into action and, knowing, as they did, that HYDRA took no prisoners in these kinds of gunfights and so it was best to reciprocate this utter lack of mercy, bullets (and arrows) were very quickly fired into fatal points in HYDRA bodies. There was some exchange from the enemy, of course, but not enough to dent the ranks of the agents.

No one shot deliberately at Bucky. Coulson had, to the surprise of only those who had worked at SHIELD for less than a year or so, issued a series of strict instructions on how to behave when faced with the Winter Soldier. At the insistence of Captain Rogers, DO NOT ATTEMPT TO KILL IF POSSIBLE was one of them. ‘ATTEMPT TO’ was added after due consideration of the fact that he was rather difficult to kill.

Through the hail of bullets, Steve spotted another man come limping around the corner. He was dressed in a suit and tie and seemed almost totally unremarkable... But there was something very dangerous in his eyes, and – barely a second after Natasha dropped her empty gun – his arm was suddenly wrapped tight around her throat, the other one pinning her hands behind her back, and he was ignoring her yells and vicious kicks to hold a gun against her temple with the arm that had been gripping her neck.

Steve’s blood ran cold, and he could hear his heart beating as he barrelled forwards, through the last dregs and remnants of the fighting, to try and reach her.

Unnoticed by him, the last HYDRA soldier fell and Clint’s bow, along with every gun and other weapon in the place, was suddenly wavering between being aimed at the Winter Soldier and the man who had somehow been dumb enough to hold a hostage against Captain America.

“You’re _stupid_.” he spat bitterly, blood and spittle flying past Natasha’s face as she cringed away from the sound of his voice. This was Agent Adin, she knew it, and he was ruthless. More so than Steve. “You think you’re so righteous, and yet you’re so _stupid_! HYDRA is the one truth of this world. HYDRA will-”

As he spoke, Bucky – who had been trembling on the spot, dead eyes wide as he forced himself not to kill those threatening him – had stumbled backwards, fist clenching and unclenching, his left fist whirring as it did the same, and spun clumsily around to see what was happening.

_She’s going to get hurt._

_Why do I care?_

_She’s a little girl. She’s my friend. He’s going to help._

_I can stop this._

Steve was breathing hard, desperately wanting to stop whatever slimeball was prepared to use a little girl as leverage, and his mind raced with solutions, but they all involved ‘shoot the bastard’ and Natasha’s small body was blocking his shot.

And then there was a gunshot and the world went numb for a moment as a hole appeared in the side of her captor’s head, blowing him sideways. She fought her way easily out of the dead man’s grip and hurled herself at Steve, who instinctively wrapped his arms around her so that she was safe.

From HYDRA, from SHIELD, from the world. Safe from everything.

There was a faint thump as Bucky collapsed to his knees, more mentally exhausted than physically, and a clatter as he let any weapons he had fall to the ground. Steve didn’t notice, but Natasha did, and she squirmed out of his grip to kneel on the ground too, next to him, and cup his face for a moment in her slender hands.

“It’s ok.” she whispered, eyes scanning over his face for any hint that he was not the same man she had talked to in their cell. “This- this is Steve Rogers. Remember?”

He nodded, swallowing, and glanced up at Steve, eyes pleading.

Steve just smiled gently, sadly, and suddenly Bucky felt safe too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be an epilogue! Thanks to all those who've been following this and encouraging me- this is the longest thing I've ever written by a LONG WAY :)


	12. Epilogue

That first night after, Natasha slept on Clint's couch while he leant against it and tried to stay awake; be on guard for her. He kept dropping off and pinching himself awake, guilty at leaving her alone for even a moment after all that had happened to her, until eventually she rolled over and threw a blanket at him, and he took the hint and went to sleep at her feet, with it wrapped around his shoulders like a poncho.

Bucky had expected that he would be taken to a cell - even if these were the good guys, and even if it was a comfortable one, because he was still dangerous and even _he_ knew that - but instead there were voices all around him telling him that it was ok, and that he was going to be ok, and a shock blanket draped over him, held in place by Steve's hand. "Hey," whispered the younger (older? Bucky didn't know why he thought Steve was younger, he just did) guy comfortingly, on a bench somewhere in medical. "Buck. You still with us, right?"  
"Course I'm with ya," croaked the soldier. He wasn't sure where the words were coming from, just that they felt right. "I'm sitting right next to you, ain't I, punk?"  
Steve tried for a moment not to smile, but he couldn't stop himself, and soon he was beaming and even Bucky found his lips twitching upwards awkwardly. When he woke up - not that he realised he had fallen asleep - it was too a tall, friendly-looking man talking with Steve, who almost immediately shook his hand, grinning.  
"Hey, man. I'm Sam, I'm Steve's friend. He never stops talking about you."  
The words were joking, but laced with honest happiness and curiosity, and Bucky blinked as a hazy memory flickered behind his eyes.  
"Did- I think I shot you?" he murmured, unfocused, and both Sam and Steve grinned.  
"Wait," he continued, before either of them had a chance to say anything else. "The little girl, Natasha, she told them... things. Information about SHIELD. They said if she didn't, they'd hurt her, so it's not her fault, but they know things about you-"  
"Like what?" frowned Steve sharply, and Bucky shrugged unhappily.  
"I don't know. She said that Barton was really bad at climbing, and that he was terrified of dogs."  
Sam and Steve exchanged a look, and both started laughing simultaneously. Misunderstanding, Bucky blinked.  
"She said Fury never talks to his agents, and that he hates children."  
At that, they only laughed harder.  
"Oh, dude," wheezed Sam. "That girl is a genius."  
"It's not true?" asked Bucky, still confused, and received some very cheerful 'Nope's.  
"...oh." He blinked, astonished. "How old is she?"  
"Twelve." said Steve, and had to restrain himself from literally hugging his friend as Bucky's eyes widened in semi-mock alarm.  
"...she is going to be so, _so_ dangerous."

And she was. She was incredibly dangerous, and she was beautiful, and she was deadly.  
But she had a chance to be human now. Not just a spider.

-Fin-


End file.
